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ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDIES. 



ALFRED BINET. 



WITH AN INTRODUCTORY ESSAY QN EXPERIMENTAL 
PSYCHOLOGY IN FRANCE. 




V'ASiU .G>9* t J l S 



CHICAGO : 

The Open Court Publishing Company 
1890. 









COPYRIGHTED|(WITH THE EXCEFTION OF THE FIRST ARTICLE) UNDER THE 
TITLE OF "PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDIES." 



These essays are a republication of original contributions made to 
The Open Court during 1889-1890. 



/■ 



TABLE OF CONTEXTS. 



PAGE 



Introductory. Experimental Psychology in France 5 

Proof of Double Consciousness in Hysterical Individuals... 14 
The Relations Between the Two Consciousnesses of Hyster- 
ical Individuals 23 

The Hysterical Eye 34 

Mechanism or Subconsciousness ? 42 

The Graphic Method and the Doubling of Consciousness... 48 

The Intensity of Subconscious States 60 

The Role of Suggestion in Phenomena of Double Conscious- 
ness 72 

Double Consciousness in Health 80 



INTRODUCTORY. 



EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY IN FRANCE. 



It is known that of late years, in France, a great 
scientific movement has come about in favor of experi- 
mental psychology. While the professors of our High 
Schools and Universities are continuing to teach an 
antiquated science, whose only method is that of in- 
trospection, there has arisen on all sides in the philo- 
sophical reviews, and even in journals strictly medical, 
a body of work in which the investigation of mental 
phenomena is conducted according to the methods of 
natural science. Incontestably, the forerunner of this 
activity in psychological inquiry was M. Taine, who 
published in 1869 an important treatise upon "The 
Understanding." With remarkable penetration M. 
Taine foresaw, to a certain extent, the most import- 
ant results obtained in recent years. Thus, the entire 
chapter upon "Images" may still be consulted with 
profit. 

The real inaugurator of the psychological move- 
ment proper, is M. Ribot. The psychologists of 
France owe much to M. Ribot. Without him, with- 
out the Review* which he founded, without the work 

* The Revue Philosophique. 



6 EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY IN FRANCE. 

and results of foreign* investigation which he has 
made known in France, many scientists would never 
have thought of devoting their attention to psycholog- 
ical research. Further, by instituting a chair at the 
Sorbonne, and subsequently, at a quite recent date, 
at the College de France, M. Ribot has helped to give 
an official consecration, in our country, to the study 
oi experimental psychology. Finally, some few years 
past, in conjunction with M. Charcot, M. Ribot 
founded a Society of Physiological Psychology which 
now counts more than fifty active members. In draw- 
ing together men of different professions, in bringing 
the psychologist into communication with the physiol- 
ogist, the physician, the alienist, the mathematician, 
and the linguist, that society has fathered a great 
number of important productions and substantially 
contributed to the development of the science of 
psychology. 

The personal work of M. Ribot is contained in four 
valuable monographs upon the Diseases of Memory, 
of Will, of Personality, and upon the Psychology of 
Attention. We are informed, moreover, that the 
author has been at work for some time past, upon the 
phenomena of emotion, and that he will perhaps pub- 
lish, some day, a monograph upon that attractive 
topic. 

It would be difficult to characterize the work of M. 
Ribot in a few words. We may say, however, that 
he has constantly endeavored to stand upon the ground- 
work of facts, entertaining a horror of metaphysics 
that is perhaps exaggerated. Not a metaphysician, 
he is neither materialist, nor spiritualist, nor monist — 

* The experimental psychology of England and the experimental psychol- 
ogy of Germany. 



INTRODUCTORY. 



nor anything of the kind. He has little love for great 
systems, and rightly gives precedence to little facts, 
accurately observed and minutely described. I be- 
lieve, with him, that the future of psychology lies not 
in great theories, but in little facts. Respecting the 
relations of the physical and the spiritual, he regards 
the matter as a simple concordance, without further 
going into the problem ; he has frequently compared 
the state of consciousness to a state superadded, 
which in no shape modifies physiological processes, 
and which acts like a shadow opposite a body. He 
affirms, in different places, that an unconscious phe- 
nomenon is nothing else than a purely physiological 
phenomenon. It will be thought, perhaps, that de- 
spite the repugnance of M. Ribot to metaphysics, a 
certain metaphysical character attaches to the ideas 
just noticed. I believe, in fact, that we know abso- 
lutely nothing regarding the nature of unconscious 
phenomena. 

The succeeding essays of this little book, however, 
will be devoted to the investigation of the latter phe- 
nomena in their relation to double consciousness ; and 
I shall there briefly present the experiments made by 
M. Pierre Janet and by myself (the latter not yet pub- 
lished) upon the signification of unconscious phe- 
nomena. 

The method employed by M. Ribot in his admir- 
able monographs, consists in elucidating the mechan- 
ism of the normal state by recourse to mental pathol- 
og}^. M. Ribot is neither a physician, nor an observer ; 
the pathological data which he makes use of are 
always second-hand ; but with an unusually extensive 
range of knowledge he unites great discernment in the 
selection and interpretation of facts. And, besides, 



8 EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY IN FRANCE. 

he presents his psychological conclusions in language 
so clear and precise, as to form a happy contrast to 
the terminology of the classic philosophers. 

In his studies in pathological psychology, the point 
to which he has given especial prominence, is the law 
of mental dissolution. This law can be regarded as 
the key-stone of the structure he has reared. He has 
very correctly observed, and better than had been 
done before him, that there are stable states— strongly 
organized, resistive ; and weak states — unstable, arti- 
ficial, and easily lost. For instance, in memory, the 
stable states are the simple and common movements 
of adaptation ; the more complex are the delicate 
movements of professional activity, the special mem- 
ories. In the will, the stable and resistive are the 
simple impulses, having their origin in an organic 
state, as hunger, thirst ; the less stable are the com- 
plex determinations ot volition, in combination with 
mobile moral elements, such as duty, or remote inter- 
est. In attention, the stable is spontaneous attention, 
kept alert by an activ3 sensation ; the weak is volun- 
tary attention and reflection. Now M. Ribot has 
shown, that in progressive mental dissolutions, the 
progression invariably follows the same order ; it pro- 
ceeds from the less stable to the more stable ; from 
the more delicately organized to the less delicately 
organized ; from the higher to the lower. In sub- 
stance, this is a great law of general pathology, of 
which M. Ribot has made a happy application to 
psychology. 

By the side of M. Ribot we shall place M. Char- 
cot, the eminent professor of the Salpetriere, who by 
his studies of nervous diseases has taken, of late, a 
prominent position in psychological science. It is M. 



INTRODUCTORY. 9 

Charcot who took the initiative in founding the So- 
ciety of Physiological Psychology ; he is president 
for life of that society. M. Charcot has written no 
special treatise upon psychology : in fact, he writes 
but very little. Aside from a few productions in con- 
junction with his pupils, the only works that we have 
from him are the reports of his lectures at the Sal- 
petriere. In these lectures the psychological method 
is frequently introduced, whenever the theme demands 
an explication of the complicated web of psychical 
phenomena. We shall cite, by way of instance, the 
lectures upon hystero-traumatic paralysis, wherein 
the eminent professor has firmly established the in- 
fluence of the idea upon motory disturbances ; and 
further mention must be made of the admirable lec- 
tures upon aphasia, wherein the psychology of lan- 
guage has been so happily resorted to in explanation 
of the diseases of that important cerebral function. 

A former pupil of M. Charcot, M. Charles Richet, 
at present professor of physiology in the Faculty of 
Medicine at Paris, has contributed to the advance- 
ment of experimental psychology in France by a con- 
siderable number of original works. After 1870, M. 
Richet was the first investigator to reinaugurate the 
study of hypnotism ; he was, likewise, the first to see 
in these studies a field of psychological research, "a 
method of intellectual and moral vivisection." Among 
the phenomena of suggestion there are several that 
belong to him especially; thus, he was the first to 
show that the personality of a subject put to sleep 
may be transformed, and every remembrance of the 
true personality effaced, by suggestion, from his 
memory, and a fictitious personality substituted. He 
has also propounded quite ingenious ideas upon the 



IO EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY IN FRANCE. 

phenomena of unconsciousness; he has brought out 
the fact, that in hysterical persons and in a great many 
individuals reputed normal, there exists a sort of a 
permanent semi-somnambulism ; in other words, there 
is, in these subjects, an unconscious ego, an uncon- 
scious activity, which is constantly on the watch, 
which contemplates, which gives attention, which re- 
flects, which forms inferences, and lastly which per- 
forms acts — all unknown to the conscious ego. Finally, 
M. Richet has published, during recent years, in the 
Revue Philosophique, of which he is an assiduous asso- 
ciate contributor, a long essay upon " Mental Sugges- 
tion," which has attracted considerable notice. His 
researches tend to the conclusion, which the author 
regards as probable, that thought is transmitted from 
one brain to another without the intervention of signs 
appreciable to our senses. The proof, the author 
himself confesses, is not complete. M. Richet arrives 
at a probability merely. The numerous treatises that 
have been published in France upon this subject, are 
to be attributed to the impetus given to the question 
by the article of M. Richet. 

Another pupil of M. Charcot, M. Fere, now physi- 
cian at the Bicetre, has distinguished himself in recent 
years by his many researches in experimental psychol- 
ogy, the subjects of which have been principally phe- 
nomena of hysteria. In conjunction with me, M. 
Fere first entered upon a course of investigations in 
hypnotism and allied subjects. Our work together, 
which still continues, has produced as its main result 
a book upon "Animal Magnetism," in which this sub- 
ject is treated of particularly as a branch of psychol- 
ogy. In this line of ideas, M. Fere has made an 
especial study of hallucinations, and of systematic 



INTRODUCTORY. II 

anesthesia and paralysis. The investigations referred 
to have occasioned a great deal of controversy in the 
circles known as the School of Nancy. The physicians 
of Nancy have called in question certain conclusions 
reached by the School of Salpetriere ; but it must be 
remarked, that as regards the facts of suggestion all 
discussions that have arisen have related only to ver- 
bal differences. 

M. Fere has lately pursued, in ingenious experi- 
ments upon hysterical and hyper-excitable subjects, 
investigations upon the psychology of movements. 
He has shown that the quantity of movement pro- 
duced depends upon the nature of the sensation. 
Every sensor.y excitation, for instance the sight of a 
red square, at first induces an augmentation of force 
— a dynamogeny — measurable on the dynamometer ; 
then, according as the excitation is prolonged, the 
force diminishes, and dynamogeny gives way to en- 
feeblement. Such, in rude outlines, are the experi- 
ments in psycho-mechanics by which M. Fere has es- 
tablished a quantitative relation between sensations 
and movements. 

We are obliged to be brief in the present sketch of 
French psychologists. In conclusion, therefore, we 
shall simply note the names of M. Espinas, who has 
published valuable studies upon animal communities ; 
Bernard Perez, who has given to the world several 
attractive volumes upon the psychology of infants ; 
Pierre Janet, to whom we owe the highly ingenious 
investigations into unconscious manifestations of mind; 
Egger, known through his highly interesting study of 
internal audition, auto-observation ; Beaunis, who has 
written upon inhibitions, upon hypnotism, upon the 
muscular sense, etc. 



12 EXPERIMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY IN FRANCE. 

Accordingly, as may be gathered from the preced- 
ing sketch, there is not, in France, a school of psychol- 
ogy ; there are no masters and disciples ; there is not 
a body of accepted doctrines. We all work upon our 
own individual score, without being subject to any 
common word of command ; we are dispersed, like 
skirmishers, upon the field of research. In his inaugu- 
ral lecture at the College de France, M. Ribot cor- 
rectly stated that the characteristic mark of French 
psychological research was the production of mono- 
graphs. We possess, in fact, a certain number of ex- 
perimental studies upon special subjects. We have no 
universal work, discussing, even in brief, the entire 
province of psychology. M. Ribot, in adverting to 
this want, said that two years would be demanded to 
prepare a treatise upon French psychology, and that, 
probably, by reason of the rapid advances being made 
in our knowledge of this subject, when the treatise 
were finished, it would no longer be available for cur- 
rent use. 

This being the character of French psychology, it 
would be very difficult to state the opinions upon 
which any great number of thinkers of our country have 
united. How do we know, for instance, the views of 
M. Charcot upon Personality, when he has not as yet 
had occasion to express himself upon that point ? All 
that we can do is to endeavor to bring into relief the 
main tendencies of French psychological inquiry and 
to indicate the methods preferentially employed. 

With relatively few exceptions, the psychologists 
of my country have left the investigations of psycho- 
physics to the Germans, and the study of comparative 
psychology to the English. They have devoted them- 
selves almost exclusively to the study of pathological 



INTRODUCTORY. 1 3 

psychology, that is to say psychology affected by dis- 
ease. Such, if I do not mistake it, is the foremost 
feature of our work in psychology. One need only 
glance at the titles of the principal original treatises of 
M. Ribot to note that they treat of pathological condi- 
tions : Diseases of Memory, of Will, of Personality, 
etc. All the other authors have followed his example; 
they have sought in the pathology of the mind or in 
the pathology of nervous action, the data to render 
intelligible the mechanism of the normal state. The 
marked favor that studies in hypnotism have met with 
in France, is a further proof of the preponderance ac- 
quired by pathological psychology. The results ob- 
tained by the systematic employment of the patholog- 
ical and clinical methods, have been extensive ; but at 
the present time they yet remain scattered in a mass 
of reports accessible only to specialists. Consequently, 
these results are almost unknown to the psychologists 
of foreign countries. Thus is explained a circum- 
stance that does not fail to excite surprise. Although 
it is well established that pathology has furnished 
psychology with the most recent and the most numer- 
our results, yet the works upon psychology appearing 
in Germany, in Italy, in England, and in America, 
and which pretend to give a complete picture of the 
present state of psychological research, say almost 
nothing of the investigations of mental and nervous 
pathology. The scientific work, really French, is not 
recognized, and is practically suppressed. 



H 



ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



Prool of Double Consciousness in Hysterical Individuals, 



The psychoii b Ists of France, during the past few 
years, have bee? diligently at work studying the phe- 
nomena of ..j able consciousness and double person- 
ality in hysterical individuals. The same problems have 
also been the subject of numerous investigations in 
foreign countries, especially in England and in Amer- 
ica ; and the phenomena of automatic writing, which 
are now so often described in the scientific periodicals 
of both the above-mentioned countries, are evidently 
due to that doubling of personality which is so mani- 
fest in a vast number of hysterical people. 

I wish to devote a series of articles to these prob- 
lems, which are of such high importance to the psy- 
chology of normal states as well as to the psychology of 
nervous diseases. After briefly recurring to the results 
of former studies, published in the Revue Philoso- 
phique, the Archives de Physiologie, and in the Comptes 
rendus de V Academie des Sciences, I shall set forth, with 
more or less extensiveness, my recent observations. 

In approaching so delicate a subject we must in the 
first instance insist upon a question of method. When 
we undertake to expound such strange phenomena as 
those of the doubling of consciousness, at the first blush 
we naturally provoke astonishment and even doubt. 
In truth, is not the idea extraordinary, that in hys- 



PROOF OF DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 15 

terical individuals there should exist two distinct per- 
sonalities, two egos united in the same person ? I 
have frequently had occasion to speak of the doubling 
of consciousness to persons who were unfamiliar with 
science, and even to physicians, and I can verify the 
fact, that people as a rule regard the phenomena in 
question as highly doubtful ; for they imagine that there 
do not yet exist precise experiments adequate to es- 
tablish this duplication of personality. In fact, in or- 
der to recognize and admit exc euingl delicate in- 
tellectual perturbations of this order, we must be pre- 
sented with objective, palpable, and actual evidence 
of their existence. The experimentalist must strive 
not only to discover the psychological phenomena which 
explain so many manifestations of mental alienation, 
but he must also, and with equal care, seek the method 
of experiment that commands conviction and that ren- 
ders such phenomena clear and evident to everybody. 

The idea of such a method has guided me from my 
earliest researches, and I have particularly endeavored 
to discover the simplest possible experiments, such as 
might be repeated at the bedside of patients without 
previous preparation by any physician that might be 
first called in. It is doubtless interesting to know, 
that at the present day we possess the means of clearly 
exhibiting the duality of persons in hysterical patients, 
without being obliged to resort to the hypnotizing of 
our subjects or to submitting them to any complex and 
ill-defined influences. The patient, in the normal con- 
dition, is almost as if awake, and the process employed 
to reveal the two personalities which he contains is 
as direct and as simple as that which consists of count- 
ing the beatings of his pulse. 

Before presenting the recent researches that I have 



l6 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

made, I believe it profitable first to recapitulate the 
processes of investigation employed. I may add that 
the results that I have obtained, have been fully con- 
firmed by the researches of other authors, among whom 
I shall cite my friend, M. Pierre Janet, who has re- 
cently published a very interesting work upon this 
topic". * 

In performing our experiment we must have re- 
course to hysterical patients who in certain parts of 
the body present a more or less extended region of in- 
sensibility (anaesthesia). Nothing is more common than 
hysterical anaesthesia. At times it will appear in the 
form of small islets, of small spots irregularly scattered 
about. An hysterical patient, for example, may ex- 
hibit a small anaesthetical spot in the palm of his hand. 
On forcing a pin into this spot, or pinching the skin, 
or burning it, the subject will not experience the 
slightest sensation of contact, or sensation of pain ; 
while, nevertheless, a few centimeters away from it 
the same excitations will produce a very keen and pain- 
ful reaction. With other patients the anaesthesia re- 
veals a more regular distribution ; it may, for example, 
comprise an entire limb, as an arm which has become 
insensible from the extremity of the fingers to the 
shoulder-joint. With other patients the distribution 
of insensibility is even still more remarkable ; the 
patient is divided into two halves by a vertical plane 
extending through the breast to the back, so that one 
half of his body — head, trunk, arm, and leg — is com- 
pletely insensible, while the half corresponding pre- 
serves its normal sensibility. Finally, it is not rare to 
meet with hysterical persons whose insensibility ex- 
tends to the entire body ; but in such cases the insen- 

* L 1 automatisme psychologique. Paris : 1889. F. Alcan. 



PROOF OF DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 17 

sibility is generally more marked in one half of the 
body than in the other. 

Let us now turn to a patient exhibiting an insensi- 
bility, extending to an entire limb. Let us fiist assure 
ourselves by means of a few painful tests that this in- 
sensibility is not simulated. Several means are adapt- 
able for this purpose. Thus, whenever a patient 
feigns the loss of sensibility, if, without warning him, 
we suddenly excite his skin from behind a screen and 
he betrays a movement of surprise, it is a proof that 
he has felt the sensation. When we allow an electric 
current of increasing intensity to pass through his 
limb, there certainly must arrive a moment, in which 
the pain is so intense that he cannot any longer endure 
it. But genuine insensibility will come out victorious 
from all such tests. Let us add that with hysterical 
individuals the power of pressure upon the dynamom- 
eter, in the insensible members, is generally weak- 
ened, and that the time of physiological reaction is 
prolonged. The tests described, accordingly, maybe 
regarded as sufficiently numerous and competent to de- 
feat any attempt at imposition. 

I suppose, now, that we are occupied with a pa- 
tient who exhibits a genuine anaesthesia, controlled by 
all the clinical tests which the modern physician has 
at his command. I shall take for granted, further, that 
this insensibility, limited to a single limb, — the right 
arm, for example, — affects all the tissues of the limb ; 
that not only the skin, but muscles, tendons, and ar- 
ticular surfaces have lost all trace of sensibility. The 
patient feels neither puncture nor compression ; neither 
pinching, faradization, nor passive movements im- 
pressed upon his limb, when we have taken care to 



l8 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

hide from him the sight of his limb by the interposi- 
tion of a screen. 

Under the above-mentioned conditions the ex- 
perimentalist seizes a finger of the insensible hand, 
and impresses upon the finger in question alternate 
movements of flexion and of extension ; the patient, 
be if understood, not being able to see his own hand, 
does not know what is being done to him ; he does 
not know whether they are bending or stretching one 
of his fingers. Nevertheless, it frequently happens that 
the finger thus manipulated spontaneously continues 
the movement which the experimentalist has im- 
pressed upon it ; we may observe that it bends and 
straightens out again five or six times. The very 
same thing would happen if we had caused the wrist 
or elbow to perform passive movements. 

Now, what does this experiment prove, which 
admittedly is very simple and easy of repetition? 
Evidently, in order that the finger should spontaneous- 
ly repeat the movement that has once been impressed 
upon it, it is necessary that the movement in ques- 
tion should have been perceived. The patient never- 
theless declares that he has not felt, or experienced, 
anything in his finger. We must, accordingly, sup- 
pose that an unconscious perception of the movement 
has been produced ; there doubtless has been a per- 
ception; the perception has engendered a similar 
movement — this too seems evident ; but neither the 
sensation nor its motory effect have entered within 
the circle of the subject's consciousness. This little 
psycho-motory performance has been accomplished 
without his knowledge, and so to speak, quite outside 
of him. 

Let us complicate our experiment a little, in 



PROOF OF DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. IQ 

Drder the better to understand it. The eyes of the sub- 
ject are throughout kept concealed behind a screen. 
We now place some familiar object into the insen- 
sible hand ; for instance, we thrust a pen-holder or a 
pencil between the thumb and the index-finger. As 
soon as the contact takes place the two fingers draw 
together, as if to seize the pen ; the other fingers bend 
half-way, the wrist leans sideways, and the hand as- 
sumes the attitude necessary to write. In the same 
manner by introducing the thumb and index-finger 
within the rings of a pair of scissors we cause the sub- 
ject to perform the movements of one who wishes to 
cut. These experiments, of course, may be varied in- 
definitely; further instances, however, would be 
superfluous; the two given amply suffice for the pur- 
poses of our analysis. 

Here also the entire transaction takes place out- 
side the consciousness of the subject; the pen-holder 
was seized by the anaesthetic hand, without the sub- 
ject's perceiving, in a conscious manner, any contact, 
and without his knowing that he held a pen-holder in 
his hand. Now, this very simple act, performed by 
the hand, is an act of adaptation ; it implies, not only 
that the object has been felt, but also that this object 
has been recognized as a pen-holder, for if the object 
had been a different one a different act of adaptation 
would have taken place. In this manner, the sen- 
sation must be said to have provoked an uncon- 
scious perception, an unconscious reasoning, an un- 
conscious volition. In short, the event happened just 
as if the pen-holder had been thrust into the sensible 
hand ; as if the subject had felt the object, had 
recognized it and decided to write ; with the sole 



20 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

difference, however, that apparently the whole process 
was without consciousness. 

The theories of Huxley and of several English 
authors concerning the part played by consciousness 
in psychological phenomena seem here to find direct 
application ; yet, as a matter of fact, this is only 
apparently so, as we presently shall see. According 
to Huxley consciousness is an epi-phenomenon, a 
superfluous phenomenon, superadded to the physio- 
logical process, but which reacts no more upon that 
process than the shadow of the individual upon the 
individual itself ; you may suppress consciousness, 
and yet all physiological phenomena will continue to 
be produced automatically just as before; objects 
will continue to be perceived ; unconscious reasonings 
will develop, followed by acts of adaptation. 

Let us add a new complication to our last ex- 
periment, and we shall find as a result, that Huxley's 
hypothesis is manifestly too simple to explain it. 
Up to this point we have limited ourselves to the 
production of movements in an insensible region ; 
these movements, however, were very elementary, 
and would not betray a well-developed thought. We 
may essay to provoke certain acts of a more in- 
tellectual character and of decidedly higher organi- 
zation. The following is an example selected, as the 
preceding ones, from among many others. 

We put a pen into the anaesthetic hand, and we 
make it write a word ; left to itself the hand preserves 
its attitude, and at the expiration of a short space of 
time repeats the word, often five or ten times. Having 
arrived at this fact, we again seize the anaesthetic 
hand, and cause it to write some familiar word, for 
example, the patient's own name ; but in so doing, 



PROOF OF DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 21 

we intentionally commit an error in spelling. In its 
turn the anaesthetic hand repeats the word, but oddly 
enough, the hand betrays a momentary hesitation 
when it reaches the letter at which the error in 
orthography was committed; if a superfluous letter 
happens to have been added, sometimes the hand will 
hesitatingly re-write the name along with the supple- 
mentary letter ; again it will retrace only a part of 
the letter in question ; and again, finally, entirely sup- 
press it. 

Plainly, when the experiment successfully reaches 
this degree of complication, we cannot explain it by 
merely invoking unconscious phenomena. The cor- 
rection of an orthographic error by the anaesthetic hand 
indicates the presence of a guiding thought ; and it is 
not perfectly clear, why the thought that directs the 
movements of the writing should be unconscious, while 
that which controls the movements of the word should 
alone be regarded as conscious. It would seem more 
logical to admit, that in these patients there exist two 
distinct consciousnesses. The first of these conscious- 
nesses gathers up the sensations proceeding from the 
sensible members : the second is more especially in 
connection with the insensible regions. 

In this manner we are able to verify that doubling 
of consciousness which in recent years has become the 
object of so many investigations. There may cer- 
tainly have been given more striking examples of the 
phenomena in question ; and there have been published 
observations in which the two consciousnesses are to 
be seen each performing a different task, and recipro- 
cally ignoring each other. But all these curious ob- 
servations are generally presented under conditions so 
very complex that it is difficult to combine them for 



22 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

the purposes of a correct verification. The methods of 
investigation, relative to hysterical anaesthesia, that 
we have just set forth, at least possess the merit of fur- 
nishing a strict proof of double consciousness. 

This, however, does not imply that the methods 
employed yield results with all patients indiscrimi- 
nately*. Many hysterical individuals do not react at all 
when the experiments mentioned are being performed 
upon them. But we must mistrust all purely negative 
experiments, which simply prove that people did not 
know how to set about the business in hand. I have 
advanced the hypothesis, that when we are unable to 
provoke the repetition of the movements, or acts of 
adaptation, in anaesthetic regions, our failure is due 
to a defect in the organization of the second con- 
sciousness ; the excitation brought to bear upon the in- 
sensible region is perfectly perceived, but it does not 
directly lead to a determined movement ; there are no 
actual associations, ready to play between sensations 
and movements. Repetition of the experiments, how- 
ever, may produce these necessary co-ordinations. 

At this point, accordingly, we are in possession of 
precise observations ; we know that in hysterical in- 
dividuals there exist phenomena of double conscious- 
ness, and using this as a starting-point, it now re- 
mains for us, to develop our knowledge of this phe- 
nomenon through additional experiments. 



2 3 



The Relations between the two Consciousnesses of 
Hysterical Individuals. 



Whenever we chance to discover a new fact, we 
seldom describe it correctly. As a rule, we regard it 
as simpler than in reality it is. The observers who 
first investigated double consciousness in hysterical 
persons occupied themselves particularly with putting 
in a clear light the phenomenon of the separation of 
the two consciousnesses ; this was, in fact, the first 
thing to be done. But the study of the numerous re- 
lations existing between these separate consciousnesses 
was almost entirely neglected. It is our purpose, in 
this paper, to recapitulate and present, in an abridged 
form, the results of investigation on this topic ; and I 
am convinced that some day it will furnish the clue 
to a great number of phenomena of mental alienation. 
Inward voices supposed to be heard by demented in- 
dividuals, their fixed and impulsive ideas, the delirium 
of possessed persons, are very probably phenomena 
produced by the doubling of consciousness, and by 
the influences that one of the consciousnesses exerts 
upon the other. 

For the time being we shall remain true to the 
methods that we have followed in our previous study. 
We shall eliminate all complex and ill-defined obser- 
vations and adhere, by preference, to small, simple, 



24 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

and precise experiments, easy of repetition, which, 
without teaching us the phenomena in their total de- 
velopment, at least yield an imperative proof of their 
reality, which certainly must be regarded as a decided 
advantage. 

Automatic writing furnishes the first illustration of 
the relations between the two consciousnesses. It is 
a most important phenomenon and is worth the trouble 
of being carefully studied. An examination of the 
scientific collections of England and America shows 
that in those countries the subject is frequently inves- 
tigated. Professor William James has recently sent 
me a woik in which he recapitulates certain very cu- 
rious experiments performed by him upon normal in- 
dividuals, or, at least, individuals who were supposed 
to be such. The results obtained by him afford me 
particular interest, since they closely resemble those 
obtained by myself with hysterical individuals. 

Automatic writing forms part of a class of move- 
ments that have now for a long time been the subject 
of inquiry in France, and which may be described 
under the general name of unconscious movements 
produced by ideas. As a result of numerous observa- 
tions it is now a well-known fact that with excitable 
individuals every idea produces in the body uncon- 
scious movements which at times are so precise and 
clear, that by registering them we are able to guess at 
the person's thoughts. The method of the experiment 
is frequently the following. The individual is asked to 
think of a word, a number, or of any object whatso- 
ever, and at the same time a pen is thrust into his 
hand, with the assurance that his thoughts will be di- 
vined. It frequently happens then, that the" person, 
although not feeling any movement in his hand, will 



RELATIONS BETWEEN THE TWO CONSCIOUSNESSES. 



25 




26 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

spontaneously write the word that he has thought of. 
This experiment affords an elementary instance of the 
operation known as thought-reading, and we at once 
understand how any clever experimentalist may be 
able to dispense with the use of the pen, and to guess 
at a man's thought by simple contact with the hand. 

As might be readily expected, such movements 
provoked by ideas are produced in hysterical persons 
with the greatest facility. When a pen-holder is placed 
in the hand of an anaesthetic subject, the automatic 
writing will be produced withouc his knowledge, and 
we are thus able to learn the most secret thoughts of 
the patient. A careful study of these movements will 
furthermore prove, that they are less simple than is 
generally supposed. They are no mere reflex- move- 
ments produced by ideas. This is proven by the fact 
that the manner in which the idea is expressed de- 
pends upon the attitude given to the anaesthetic hand. 
Thus, we ask the subject to think of the number 3. 
If he holds a pen in his hand he will write the figure 3. 
If he has no pen, and if before the experiment we 
have several times shaken the fingers of the insensible 
hand, the subject will raise his finger three times ; the 
same will apply to the wrist or to the movement of any 
other member. If the subject has a dynamometer in 
his hand he will press three distinct times upon this 
instrument. If the experimentalist himself assumes 
the initiative by raising the finger of the subject a cer- 
tain number of times, the finger after having yielded 
three times to the impressed movement will stiffen, as 
if it thus wished to inform the experimentalist of the 
number that had been thought of. Ail these experi- 
ments, and particularly the last, show the intervention 
of the second consciousness in the expression of the 



RELATIONS BETWEEN THE TWO CONSCIOUSNESSES. 27 

idea of the number three. The first consciousness fur- 
nishes the idea, and the second consciousness deter- 
mines the manner in which the idea shall be expressed ; 
there is, accordingly, a concurrence of the two con- 
sciousnesses, a collaboration of the two egos for one 
common task. 

By a singular phenomenon the automatic writing 
does not limit itself to making known what takes place 
in the principal consciousness of the subject ; it is at 
the same time in the service of the second conscious- 
ness, so that, according to the nature of the cases at 
issue, the first consciousness sometimes directs the 
hand of the subject and at other times the second con- 
sciousness. We have collected several observations 
which leave no doubt on this point. Let us begin with 
the very simplest. 

Letting the subject hold a pen in his anaesthetic 
hand, we trace a letter, or some such sign, upon the 
back of the hand. The automatic writing will at once 
reproduce the word that has been traced ; the word 
itself, be it understood, not having been perceived by 
the principal consciousness, because the excitation was 
performed upon the skin of an anaesthetic member, 
and because anaesthesia in some way is the barrier 
separating the two consciousnesses. If the word has 
been reproduced, it accordingly must be because the 
second consciousness has perceived it, and conse- 
quently this simple experiment proves that the second 
consciousness can express itself by automatic writing. 

It may be remarked, in passing, that automatic 
writing affords us a very convenient means of explor- 
ing the sensibility of any apparently anaesthetic limb ; 
and we are also able by employing this method to 
measure the sensibility with an aesthesiometer. In 



28 



ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 




V 



rt g 



.a s 



*. £ 



-m en >5 -o^ 



RELATIONS BETWEEN THE TWO CONSCIOUSNESSES. 20, 

fact, nothing is simpler. Let us prick the insensible 
hand with one of the points of a pair of compasses : 
the automatic writing will trace a single point. There- 
upon let us apply at the same time both points, and 
the automatic writing, after a little practice, will be able 
to tell us whether the points have been distinguished 
or confounded ; their distance apart, in millimeters, 
will give us the respective degree of sensibility. Every 
time that I applied this method to hysterical subjects 
I was able to verify that notwithstanding anaesthesia 
sensibility had remained normal; we can easily under- 
stand that the contradiction here is only in the terms 
employed. 

Automatic writing does not only serve to express 
sensations perceived by the second consciousness ; it 
is likewise able to express the thoughts that this sec- 
ond consciousness spontaneously combines. Hyster- 
ical persons have been found who, when a pen was 
put into their hands and their attention diverted, began 
to write, unconsciously, entire well-connected phrases, 
recitals, confessions, etc. The principal subject — the 
one with whom we communicate by word — suspects 
nothing, and does not see what his anaesthetic hand is 
doing ; it is the second consciousness which employs 
this mode of expression. I myself have made this ex- 
periment upon a subject, and other authors have like- 
wise reported several instances. 

The latter form 01 experiment is evidently the one 
that approaches nearest to the experiments upon au- 
tomatic writing which at the present time are being 
conducted in England and America. They consist in 
asking a person to place his hand upon a planchette 
that can serve for the purposes of writing and to re- 
main immovable without thinking of anything. When 



3<D ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

the subject is nervous it will sometimes happen that 
the planchette becomes agitated and begins to write 
thoughts entirely foreign to the subject ; the latter re- 
mains motionless and has no consciousness of any- 
thing. It may be assumed, with great likelihood, that 
under such conditions an intellectual doubling of the 
subject takes place, analogous to that which we have 
observed in our hemi-ansesthetic, hysterical patients. 
Only, in the case of an hysterical individual, the doub- 
ling is easier, in consequence of the insensibility which 
reigns in a part of the body; it being easily compre- 
hensible that the acts of the second consciousness, pro- 
duced by preference in the insensible regions, remain 
unknown to and concealed from the principal con- 
sciousness. It may happen, however, with certain non- 
hysterical subjects that experiments of doubling bring 
about a transitory anaesthesia, and Mr. W. James has 
recently observed, that while one of his patients was 
writing with the planchette he did not feel the painful 
excitations inflicted upon his arm, whereas the second 
consciousness perceived them distinctly, and com- 
plained of the same by means of the automatic writing. 
Such complications of phenomena produce conse- 
quences which it is easy to foresee. It may happen 
that at the moment at which the principal conscious- 
ness wishes to write a word, the second consciousness 
may have the same intention, and may wish to write 
an entirely different word : hence a conflict. A very 
simple experiment will illustrate this conflict. Let us 
seize the anaesthetic hand, and let us cause it to trace 
behind a screen the word "Paris." We know that 
this word will be repeated several times. Thereupon 
addressing ourselves to the principal subject, we will 
ask him to write the word " London." The subject, 



RELATIONS BETWEEN THE TWO CONSCIOUSNESSES. 31 

entirely ignorant of what has just taken place, eagerly 
seizes the pen with the intention to carry out our wish, 
but to his utter astonishment the indocile pen instead 
of writing London, writes Paris. Is not this a phe- 
nomenon analogous to those irresistible impulses which, 
in madness, consciously reveal themselves, — impul- 
sions to theft, murder, arson, etc., which suddenly 
manifest themselves to the great surprise of the pa- 
tient, the latter submitting to the impulse without com- 
prehending it. It is evident that these kinds of ex- 
periments are destined to throw a flood of light upon 
several still obscure points of mental pathology. 

In the preceding exposition we have studied the 
motory relations of the two consciousnesses ; we have 
seen them either uniting their efforts to accomplish the 
same act, or conflicting with regard to something to 
be accomplished. But there exists a second kind of 
relations between the two consciousnesses ; namely, 
the relations of sensations and of images. It may hap- 
pen that the sensation which has possession of a first 
consciousness awakens an associated image in the sec- 
ond consciousness, so that, by a unique intellectual 
process, one of the parts will be conscious for one of 
the egos, and the other for the second ego. The facts 
pertaining to this order of relations are extremely cu- 
rious and instructive. We shall limit ourselves to 
those that are the simplest and most easily produced. 

Let us once more turn our attention to an anaes- 
thetic, hysterical patient ; we will make a series of im- 
pressions upon his insensible hand ; our subject feels 
absolutely nothing. It would, accordingly, be idle to 
ask him how many impressions we have made, be- 
cause he does not even suspect that his hand has been 
pressed. And yet, the highly extraordinary fact re- 



g2 ON DOUBLECON^nL'S^hhS. 

mains, that the subject, although apparently not hav- 
ing felt anything, possesses an idea of the number of 
excitations that have been made upon him. The fol- 
lowing is proof: Let us make ten punctures in the in- 
sensible hand and thereupon let us ask the subject, 
who, as a matter of course, has not seen his hand, 
which is hidden behind a screen, to think of some num- 
ber and to name it; very frequently the subject will 
answer that he is thinking of the number ten. In the 
same manner let us put a key, a piece of coin, a nee- 
dle, a watch into the anaesthetic hand, and let us ask 
the subject to think of any object whatsoever ; it will 
still happen, yet less frequently than in the preceding 
experiment, that the subject is thinking of the precise 
object that has been put into his insensible hand. 

It is important to note, that in all these cases the 
subject believes he is thinking voluntarily and without 
constraint ; the experimentalist, while compelling him 
to think of the number ten, not depriving him of the 
illusion of his freedom of will. 

How shall we explain this result ? How is it pos- 
sible that, in consequence of an excitation not felt, the 
subject should have a determined idea? We shall be 
able to explain everything by supposing simply, that 
the unconscious peripheral excitation, for example the 
puncture of the anaesthetic hand, awakens, by way of 
association, corresponding phenomena of ideation. 
But in reality matters are more complex. We have 
to admit rather, that when we excite the anaesthetic 
hand, in different ways, by puncture or by contact with 
an object, the second consciousness perceives the sen- 
sation, counts the punctures, recognizes the object, 
and, for the purposes involved, abandons itself to more 
or less complicated intellectual acts. These intellect- 



RELATIONS BETWEEN THE TWO CONSCIOUSNESSES. 3 J" 

ual acts are the final stage of the process, which has 
had its origin in a sensation ; now this final point, this 
result, this conclusion is the thing that alone penetrates 
into the first consciousness. For example, when punct- 
ures are made in the skin, one of the consciousnesses 
counts the sensations, finds their sum- total, and this 
sum-total it is that reaches the other consciousness, 
not indeed under the form of tactile sensations, but 
under the abstract form of a number. 

To sum up. From the foregoing we perceive that 
the separation of the two consciousnesses does not in- 
terrupt all communications between them. The asso- 
ciations of ideas, of images, perceptions, and move- 
ments, that is, of all that pertains to the sphere of 
lower psychology, is preserved nearly intact ; and 
hence an idea in the first consciousness provokes a 
movement in the second, and inversely, a sensation 
perceived by the second consciousness can awaken an 
idea in the first consciousness. 

In the following essay we shall apply these results 
to the study of the hysterical eye. 



34 



ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



THE HYSTERICAL EYE. 



The various forms of retinal sensibility which are 
met with in hysterical individuals have been carefully 
studied by M. Charcot and his pupils, who have shown 
that the phenomena in question, which persist during 
the interval of hysterical crises, and which can exist 
where there are no crises, constitute permanent stig- 
mata, enabling us to discover hysteria without the aid 
of convulsive attacks of any sort. At the present time 
we are quite well acquainted with hysterical amaurosis, 
with the concentric contraction of the field of vision, 
with disturbances affecting the perception of colors, 
and disorders of adjustment. 

What is much less known, is the reason, the mech- 
anism, of this anaesthesia of the retina. The many ex- 
perimentalists who have hitherto studied the subject 
in question, have pointed out a number of peculiar 
features rather difficult of comprehension, in fact so 
strange and striking, that some have ascribed them to 
simulation on the part of the subjects. To furnish a 
precise and clear instance of this, we may state, that 
there are hysterical individuals who, with both eyes 
open, perceive colors which they cannot distinguish 
with one of their eyes alone ; while it seems even more 
wonderful that there should be hysterical persons who 
do not see at all with one eye, when that eye alone is 
open, but whose unilateral blindness disappears as 



THE HYSTERICAL EYE. 35 

soon as the function of vision is performed simulta- 
neously with both eyes. 

Let us dwell for a moment upon the instance given, 
and later we shall endeavor to explain it. 

We have for examination an hysterical person who 
has entirely lost the sight of the right eye. Let us 
place before the patient's eyes a 'box of Flees ' ; that 
is. a box furnished with two eye-holes. On the bottom 
of the box are placed two points of different colors, 
the one to the right, the other to the left , and by a 
skillful arrangement the patient sees with his right eye 
the point situated to the left, and with his left the point 
situated to the right. This is the method employed 
to detect shamming and simulation ; for instance, in 
the case of soldiers drafted lor the army. Thus the 
shamming individual, who pretends not to see with 
his right eye, will say that he does not see the point 
which appears to the right ; but that is the point which 
is seen by the left eye. The hysterical individual 
acts somewhat differently, for he actually sees the 
two points — that to the left, and that to the right ; he 
accordingly sees with both eyes. 

A great many hypotheses have been advanced in 
order to explain these apparent contradictions — ana- 
tomical hypotheses, like that of M. Parinaud, and psy- 
chological hypotheses, like that of M. Bernheim. For 
the time being we shall leave this matter aside. It 
will be far more profitable to begin by setting forth our 
recent observations; for a simple observation can often 
better point out the incorrectness of an hypothesis 
than any number of arguments. 

Experiments which we have made in the preceding 
essays with reference to the insensibility of the sense 
of touch in hysterical subjects, have shown us of what 



36 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

nature this insensibility really is. As a matter of fact 
the hysterical subject is doubled ; he possesses two 
distinct consciousnesses ; and one of these conscious- 
nesses accurately perceives all the excitations that have 
been impressed upon the insensible region. 

We might already suppose, ' a priori ' , that insen- 
sibility of the retina cannot in any respect differ from 
insensibility of the skin in hysterical persons. The 
facts that we have previously set forth, confirmed by 
different authors and derived from our own experi- 
ments, are too significant not to be general. But, we 
cannot be satisfied with purely theoretical views. 

I long sought in vain for some simple, decisive, 
and purely clinical experiment which might prove that 
the sensibility of the retina, in cases of hysterical 
anaesthesia, was only dissociated arid not destroyed. 
Chance, aided in some degree by perseverance, has 
enabled me to establish the following fact. We place 
the hysterical subject before a scale of printed letters, 
and tentatively seek the maximum distance from the 
board at which the subject is able to read the largest 
letters. It frequently happens with hysterical per- 
sons that the vision of forms at a distance is very 
imperfect ; a circumstance which may be owing either 
to weakness of visual acuteness or to a defect in the 
mechanism of adjustment. For the present we are 
not attempting to distinguish these two facts from one 
another. 

After having experimentally determined the max- 
imum distance at which the subject can read the larg- 
est letters of the series, we invite him to read certain 
smaller letters that are placed below the former. Na- 
turally enough the subject is unable to do so; but, if 
at this instant, we slip a pencil into the anaesthetic 



THE HYSTERICAL EYE. 



37 



hand, we are able, by the agency of the hand, to in- 
duce automatic writing, and this writing will repro- 
duce precisely the letters which the subject is in vain 
trying to read. 

This process of experimentation has the pre-em- 
inent advantage of taking the subject in his natural 
condition — while awake and at rest ; for the power 
of automatic writing persists with him, and this auto- 
matic writing has moreover the advantage of revealing 
to us the latent depths of consciousness that remain 
unknown to the subject. 

After the investigations which we have made upon 
the hysterical anaesthesia of the skin, an explanation of 
the preceding phenomenon seems to me wholly super- 
fluous, and I. shall be satisfied with«the assertion that 
the second consciousness possesses a stronger visual 
acuteness than the first consciousness. 

It is highly interesting to observe, that during the 
very time the subject is repeatedly declaring, that he 
does not see the letters, the anaesthetic hand, unknown 
to him, writes out the letters one after another. If, 
interrupting the experiment, we ask the subject to 
write, of his own free will, the letters of the printed 
series, he will not be able to do so, and when asked 
simply to draw what he sees, he will only produce a 
few zig-zag marks that have no meaning. 

Let us further remark, that although the subject 
maintains that he sees nothing, the automatic writing 
nevertheless reproduces all the letters marked on the 
black-board with perfect regularity, without omitting 
a single letter, beginning at the first and finishing 
with the last. We must, accordingly, suppose that 
during the experiment the second consciousness di- 



38 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

rects the line of sight, without the knowledge of the 
principal subject. 

The visual acuteness of this second consciousness 
in the subjects which I have examined has seemed to 
me to be equal to the normal acuteness. If we place the 
subject at too great a distance from the black-board 
the automatic writing will begin to hesitate ; the sub- 
ject will thereupon commit real mistakes ; for example, 
he will read "Lucien" instead of " Louisa," which, 
incidentally observed, proves that the phenomenon 
wrongly bears the name of automatic writing ; an au- 
tomaton does not mistake ; the second consciousness, 
on the contrary, is subject to error because it is a 
consciousness, because it is a thing that reasons and 
combines thoughts. 

In the course of investigations of this kind there 
sometimes arise certain perturbations which are very 
important to understand, and which afford a fresh proof 
of those manifold relations existing between the two 
consciousnesses that we investigated in a former pa- 
per. Thus, when the subject is convinced that he can- 
not read the letters on the board, it may happen that 
the automatic writing, controlled by this state of con- 
sciousness, will confine itself to translating the same, 
so that the anaesthetic hand will indistinctly trace the 
words which the subject is muttering in a low voice to 
himself, as "I do not see, I do not see . . . . " 

A second perturbation arises from the fact, that the 
subject, during the time that the hand is unconsciously 
writing the word, believes he has a vague perception 
of this same word. In reality this is only an illusory 
perception. To produce this phenomenon we have to 
call into play the automatic writing, by putting a pen- 
cil into the anaesthetic hand ; and, as a matter of fact, 



THE HYSTERICAL EYE. 39 

it is the more or less vague perception of these move- 
ments of automatic writing that makes the subject be- 
lieve he has a visual perception of the word, whereas 
he has only a visual image of the same. Even this 
image, at times, is rather vague. Thus, one of our 
subjects, while his hand wrote the word " Marguerite, " 
said he thought he saw the name of a woman. But, 
how could it be possible to perceive, with his eyes, 
that a word is the name of a woman, if he could not 
spell the word in question ? Evidently, in this case, 
visual or muscular sensations belonging to the second 
consciousness, have provoked in the first conscious- 
ness an idea of the same kind. 

We have already observed an analogous fact in 
the experiments before reported upon the anaesthesia 
of the skin and of the muscles ; we there saw, that if 
we shake twice in succession an insensible finger, the 
subject will think of the number two. The perception 
of the movements of the finger by the second con- 
sciousness had called forth in the domain of the first 
consciousness an analogous idea, expressed in an ab- 
stract form. 

Let us remark, in passing, that through these ex- 
periments there possibly exists a means of studying 
abstract ideas. 

We have now studied the perception of forms in an 
eye presenting a weak visual acuteness. The same func- 
tion may be studied in a completely amaurotic eye, 
that is, in an eye afflicted with total blindness. It is 
rare to meet with hysterical patients in whom insensi- 
bility of the retina reaches the verge of blindness ; but 
we can very easily produce this phenomenon by way 
of hypnotic suggestion. I have had occasion to study 
two hysterical subjects in whom by suggestion all man- 



40 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

ner of vision had been suppressed in the right eye. I 
was easily able to establish the fact, that after closing 
the left eye of the subject, and putting into his anaes- 
thetic hand, without his knowledge, a pencil, the au- 
tomatic writing was brought to reproduce all the let- 
ters which we passed before the amaurotic eye. This 
amaurotic eye, accordingly, did see, notwithstanding 
its apparent blindness ; in other words, the second con- 
sciousness was the one that saw ; it had not been struck 
with blindness at the same time as the first conscious- 
ness. 

This latter experiment enables us absolutely to re- 
ject any anatomical theory that has been designed to 
explain the singular phenomena of which we have 
spoken at the beginning of this paper. We have said 
that certain subjects, who with their right eye do not 
perceive a certain color — for example, violet — will, 
when seeing with both eyes, easily distinguish this 
same color, even when, owing to the experimental ar- 
rangement employed, the color mentioned is not placed 
in the visual field of the left eye. This experiment, 
and many others of a similar kind, lead us to sup- 
pose, that the conditions of binocular vision are dif- 
ferent from those of monocular vision. 

To speak a little more precisely, it has been ad- 
mitted that there exist two different kinds of visual 
centres within the cerebral cortex ; in the first place 
monocular centres, which act, when only one eye is 
open ; and further, binocular centres, that perform 
their functions when both eyes are at the same time 
open. Cerebral physiology, with its usual compla- 
cency, has furnished more than one argument in favor 
of this hypothesis, which, however, ought to be re- 
garded as open to considerable suspicion. This be- 



THE HYSTERICAL EYE. 



4 1 



ing admitted, nothing seemed more easy than to ex- 
plain, how and why hysterical individuals see certain 
colors when both eyes are open, and not when only 
one eye performs its functions ; people have thought, 
that it was owing to the fact, that with such subjects 
the binocular centre is spared while the monocular 
centre alone is affected. 

The last of our experiments absolutely refutes this 
theory, showing us that a subject with an amaurotic 
eye is able to register through automatic writing the ob- 
jects that are placed before it during monocular vis- 
ion. The monocular centre,accordingly,if it really exist, 
cannot be an} 7 more affected than the binocular centre. 

We shall not linger any longer upon this study of 
visual anaesthesia, which once again proves to us the 
importance of the doubling of consciousness in hys- 
terical persons, and the necessity of knowing this pro- 
cess of doubling, in order to understand certain symp- 
toms, at first sight so strange, and yet at bottom so 
logical, which are met with, at every side, in hysteria. 

We now know the most elementary facts at the 
basis of mental dissociation, and we may attempt to 
plunge to a still greater depth into the study of the 
phenomenon described. 



42 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



MECHANISM OR SUBCONSCIOUSNESS? 



In all the experiments that I have hitherto pre- 
sented, I have supposed in hysterical persons the 
existence of a double consciousness. This hypothesis 
possessed the advantage of explaining how it happens 
that we are able to provoke in the limbs of such indi- 
viduals various complex movements of adaptation, 
which are performed without their knowledge ; and 
we, accordingly, proceeded upon the assumption that 
these movements were regulated by a secondary con- 
sciousness, which does not amalgamate with the prin- 
cipal personality. 

But the objection has recently been made, that the 
hypothesis of double consciousness is not necessary, 
and that we might explain all the experiments in 
question by presuming that the movements of the 
insensible members are parcel of that mechanical 
activity which is constantly seen at work in habit and 
instinct, and which seems to perform its functions 
without the aid of consciousness. 

This second explanation, at first blush, is so natu- 
ral, that when I began my researches I did not hesitate 
to accept it, even contrary to the opinion of my friend 
M. Pierre Janet, who adopted the hypothesis of sub- 
conscious phenomena. But later, according as my 
observations and experiments became more numerous, 
I was compelled to abandon the explanation founded 



MECHANISM OR SUBCONSCIOUSNESS? 43 

upon mechanical acts. This, I admit, cost me a great 
deal; for it is singular to observe, how, despite our- 
selves, and the desire of being impartial, we ever 
reluctantly surrender a first idea. I shall, there- 
fore, essay to recapitulate the facts that have brought 
about my conviction. Some of these facts are new ; 
but the greater part have already been published by 
me in the Revue philosophique of February, 1889 ; and 
M. Pierre Janet in his recent book on psychological 
automatism (T Automatisme psychologique~) has added 
other facts that are highly interesting. 

Let us begin with the simplest cases. 

We have before us a lady patient, observed in the 
waking state, whose anaesthetic hand, hidden behind 
a screen, repeats the movements that it is made to per- 
form ; the patient feels nothing, suspects nothing, and 
believes that her hand is motionless. This repetition 
of the movement may be regarded as a physiological 
act devoid of consciousness. Let us complicate slightly 
the experiment in question. Let us cause the hand to 
trace the patient's own name, and, in so doing, com- 
mit an orthographical error ; it frequently happens 
that the hand, in re-writing the name, hesitates when it 
reaches the error, or will even correct it. We may 
still, perhaps, maintain that this is a physiological act 
devoid of consciousness. But let us continue. There 

are patients, St. Am for example, whose hand 

spontaneously finishes the word they are made to 
trace ; thus, I cause the letter d to be written ; the 
hand continues, and writes don ; I write pa, and 
the hand continues and writes pavilion ; I write Sal, 
and the hand writes : Salpetriere. Is it possible that 
this is an act destitute of consciousness ? The ques- 
tion, manifestly, is become more doubtful. But there 



44 



ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



is a more convincing instance still, for the following 
case is the most curious that has come under my 
notice. M. Taine was speaking to me one day, in de- 
tail, of an observation that he has inserted in the pre- 
face to his beautiful book on Intelligence {T Intelli- 
gence). The observation in question relates to a young 
girl who, at times, would unconsciously seize a pen, 
and write a whole page, the sense of which she did not 
understand; this page, always signed by the same, 
name, (M. Taine told me that it was the name of the 
girl's governess,) was the expression of mournful ideas 
and sorrowful reflections upon life. What particularly 
interested me in the matter of this observation was 
the fact, that I myself, in an observation of my own, 
have obtained an entirely analogous result, and M. 
Pierre Janet, likewise, has gotten five or six more. The 
lady patient, whom I observed, was an hysterical sub- 
ject, whose right arm was totally insensible. On cer- 
tain days, when a pen was put into her right hand be- 
hind a screen, the hand in question, without further 
solicitation, would begin to write connected phrases, 
to which the mind of the patient remained wholly for- 
eign, for while her hand was writing, the patient would 
be chatting with us about something entirely different. 
Concerning the explanation of these last facts, the 
slightest doubt no longer seems permissible ; and it 
is likewise certain that authors who have gathered 
equally complicated observations, have not hesitated 
in regard to the manner in which they are to be ex- 
plained. 

In fine, we behold, in this instance, the writing of 
the anaesthetic hand become the secretary of a com- 
plete personality, endowed with its own 'exclusive 
ideas, and its own emotions. M. Taine, without the 



MECHANISM OR SUBCONSCIOUSNESS? 45 

thought of an objection, admits that these facts are 
explained by the existence of two personalities in jux- 
taposition. 

I well know that a skeptic could always maintain 
that the second personality, revealed in our experi- 
ments, is a personality destitute of consciousness. I 
am, indeed, unable to furnish the material proof to 
convince such a skeptic that he is mistaken. The 
question of consciousness, as in a future article I shall 
have occasion fully to demonstrate, is one of the most 
delicate problems that a psychologist could undertake 
to solve. Upon the whole, however, it seems to me 
that there is a great probability in favor of the ac- 
ceptance of the element of consciousness in such 
complex psychic manifestations as those I have just 
cited. 

M. Pierre Janet has added to the subject in ques- 
tion a further argument, that ought to be regarded as 
convincing. How are we led to recognize, he asks, 
the existence of consciousness in another individual? 
When we find, for example, that the individual utters 
connected words, conveying sense. But, if the word 
is one mode of expression of conscious thought, writ- 
ing must be regarded as another, equally complex, or 
even more so; and we are unable to understand why 
writing should not prove as much as the spoken word. 

Moreover, in order to render this demonstration 
perfectly convincing, we will say, that there are pa- 
tients in whom this second personality speaks, even 
in the state of wake. Here, at least if I consult my 
own experience, we have to do with entirely excep- 
tional cases. Thus, I have seen three patients who, 
when we slightly pricked their insensible member, 
suddenly would complain in a loud voice, crying : 



/|_6 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

"You hurt me !" It was the second, personality that 
spoke, for if we addressed the patient directly and 
called her by her own name, she would invariably 
declare that she had said nothing. I did not follow 
out the study of these curious phenomena, because at 
the beginning of my researches I did not know whether 
they were real or simulated. But M. Pierre Janet 
has observed similar ones under circumstances so pre- 
cise, that now I no longer doubt their exactitude. 

Here, accordingly, the second personality of the 
hysterical patient not only writes of its own accord, 
but speaks even. Shall we still maintain that this is 
an unconscious personality ? 

But this is not all. We know of even more con- 
vincing facts. We know of observations, in which 
this second personality, ever awake, is seen gradu- 
ally to develop more and more, and to assume the 
initiative in conduct, instead of the first personality, 
which is temporarily annihilated. Such is the case 
of Felida, the interesting patient whose history M. 
Azam reported twenty years ago, which people at 
that epoch could not have been expected to under- 
stand, but at the present time is perfectly elucidated 
by all the data which in an abridged form we are plac- 
ing before the reader. With Felida there occurred 
certain critical periods, as the effect of which her 
character would completely change and a part of her 
recollections would disappear ; she passed into a new 
state — into her second condition, as M. Azam called 
it ; this second condition, which would last weeks and 
even months, was connected by memory with her pre- 
vious "second" conditions. Thus she would remem- 
ber persons, whom she had seen in former "second" 
conditions, but she did not remember those whom 



MECHANISM OR SUBCONSCIOUSNESS? 47 

she had seen in the intervals. Thus there was 
developed within the patient a real double personality, 
not co-existent, but successive. 

The facts above set forth have led me to the 
assumption that there may exist in hysterical patients 
two rational faculties, that are mutually ignorant of 
each other. I do not regard this as a simple hypo- 
thesis; it is an induction, in my opinion perfectly legit- 
imate. 

To me it seems difficult, upon the occasion of 
every case examined and every movement produced 
in the anaesthetic member, to declare whether the 
movement in question is accompanied by conscious- 
ness ; the criterion which we employ is too uncertain 
to be everywhere applied with infallibility. But I be- 
lieve it satisfactorily established in a general way, that 
two states of consciousness, not known to each other, 
can co-exist in the mind of an hysterical patient.* 

We discover at once the psychological conclusion 
to be drawn from the preceding experiments ; namely, 
that the limits of introspection are not those of con- 
sciousness ; and that where we have not conscious- 
ness, there is not necessarily unconsciousness. Such 
are the very important and very curious facts that to 
me seem destined to reconstruct the theory of the 
unconscious. 

* I cannot adduce here all the arguments upon which my position is 
based. I shall only refer, in this note, to the interesting researches of M. 
Pierre Janet upon "systematic anaesthesia." 



48 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



THE GRAPHIC METHOD AND THE DOUBLING 
OF CONSCIOUSNESS. 



Psychologists, in the last few years, have come 
by many different ways to establish the fact that in 
hysterical patients a plurality of persons exists. The 
curious observation, for example, of Doctor Azam, of 
Bordeaux, may be recalled, where a young woman, 
by the name of Felida, manifestly hysterical, presented 
two successive lives in which she possessed neither 
the same character nor had the same recollections.* 
Azam's observation does not stand alone. There are 
others recorded, very many in fact, of the same kind; 
as for instance that of Doctor Dufay. In his "Dis- 
eases of Personality," M. Ribot has given a complete 
history of this interesting question. 

The experiments that we presented in a former 
series of articles on this subject, and the similar ex- 
periments of M. Pierre Janet, accordingly, set forth 
nothing new. We have simply found a method of re- 
vealing in the majority of persons afflicted with hys- 
teria those remarkable phenomena of duplication 
which hitherto seemed somewhat exceptional. We 
have established, almost with certainty in fact, that in 
such subjects there exists side by side with the prin- 
cipal personality a secondary personality, which is un- 

*Azam, Double Conscience, etc.: J. B. Bailliere, Paris. 



THE EMPLOYMENT OF THE GRAPHIC METHOD. 49 

known by the first, which sees, hears, reflects, reasons, 
and acts. 

In following out our study of the methods that 
enable, us to reveal this hidden personality, we are now 
to have recourse to the so-called graphic method, the em- 
ployment of which, at first restricted to the work-rooms 
of physiology, seems, at the present time, destined to 
find its way into the current practice of medicine. 

The principle upon which this method works, con- 
sists, as we know, in the transmission of the move- 
ment we desire to study, to a lever the pointed ex- 
tremity of which writes upon a revolving cylinder. The 
transmission of the movement to the lever may be 
effected by various means, the simplest of which is a 
rubber-tube having communication with an expansible 
chamber, which moves the lever. Every pressure ex- 
erted upon the rubber will be transmitted to the lever 
by the column of air enclosed within the tube, and thus 
trace a line upon the cylinder. This line presents va- 
rious characteristics to be noted. When the lever is 
at rest, and no movement is transmitted to it, the line 
that it traces is perfectly rectilinear; if, on the con- 
trary, it receives a pressure, it will trace a curve more 
or less uneven, which will rise above the line traced 
when at rest, designated the line of abscissas. This 
curve, by the height to which it rises above the line of 
abscissas, will indicate the amplitude of the move- 
ment; by its length upon the cylinder, of which we 
know the velocity of rotation, it will indicate, and that 
with absolute precision, the rapidity of the movement ; 
and finally, its form will indicate the form of the 
movement. This, in few words, is the principle of 
the wonderful method that has given a new status to 
the physiology of movement. 



5o 



ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



How may this method be applied to the study of 
the doubling of consciousness ? How are we to get a 
line that will exhibit a relation to this disorder of the 
mind ? The question was put to me by several psy- 
chologists to whom I had discovered the present sub- 
ject of my investigations. But the difficulty is at once 
removed when we reflect that each separate personal- 
ity can be brought to execute movements, and that 
these movements can be registered. 

For example, we have an hysterical patient, hemi- 

anaesthetical on the left side; her name is P. S , 

and she will be the subject of the experiments the de- 
scription of which is to follow. She is a young girl, 
twenty years of age, tall, well-developed, intelligent, 
and of a serious disposition, yet who is subject to 
dreadful convulsive attacks and in the intervals of 
these attacks, to delirious crises. We shall study her 
during one of these intervals of repose. With her, the 
movements of the second personality which are com- 
monly called "automatic writing," are highly devel- 
oped in the insensible portion of her body ; thus, if we 
tell her to think of a number, her anaesthetic hand will 
be seen to execute movements in connection with the 
number thought of ; if we tell her to count the beats 
of a metronome, her hand, while she is counting, will 
be seen gently to keep time. These different move- 
ments are performed without the participation of will, 
or even of consciousness on her part ; they may be 
called, if we choose, automatic movements, but it is 
not to be forgotten that they are extremely complex, 
and that it would be improper to liken them to simple 
reflex motions. We return, here, to an important 
question that we have touched upon in our^ first article. 
Repetition, perhaps, is necessary. We said there that 



THE EMPLOYMENT OF THE GRAPHIC METHOD. 5 1 

the movements performed by the anaesthetic member 
under the influence of an idea, sometimes exhibit all 
the marks of a movement that is intellectual, the result 
of a reflective act and of volition. One of the proofs 
that may be given of this, is, that with our patient P. 

S the application of a recording instrument to the 

anaesthetic member greatly increases the intensity of 
the movements ; and that when the instrument is taken 
away they slacken, without, however, completely dis- 
appearing. Furthermore, the form of the movement 
varies with the form of the apparatus applied. If we 
simply place a pencil in the insensible hand while the 
subject is thinking of the number 5, she will write 5; 
if we place a dynamograph in her hand, she will press 
five times ; if a myographic drum be used, which is an 
arrangement to measure muscular dilatation, and if 
that apparatus be applied to the forearm, the forearm 
performs a movement. In short, there is in all these 
cases an intelligent adaptation to the form of the ap- 
paratus used. If still other facts be required to de- 
monstrate the complex nature of the movements in 
question, we may say that they are not produced at the 
outset in all patients; but it is necessary to wait for a 
time — for example, to strike the metronome with regu- 
larity some several minutes in succession, in order that 
the second personality which has control of these 
movements may comprehend what is wanted of it, and 
execute the same. Thus, for example, if during an 
experiment a key be let fall upon the table, the subject 
will not at once perform an automatic movement ; but 
if the key be let fall at equal intervals, or if we regu- 
larly strike a metronome, a moment will arrive when 
the movements will be produced and when they will 
regulate their rhythm to keep time with the sound 



52 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

heard. Sometimes, even, it happens that when the 
metronome is suddenly stopped, the subject, not be- 
ing warned of our intention, continues to produce an 
automatic movement or semi-contraction. 

These few facts suffice to show us, that the in- 
voluntary and unconscious movements an hysterical 
subject performs when under the influence of a pre- 
dominant idea or upon hearing the beats of a metro- 
nome, reveal a directive process of reasoning and a 
directive volition. They are voluntary movements on 
the part of the second personality of the patient. 

These movements are, as we have already remarked, 
greatly stimulated by the application of an instrument 
to receive them, and I have witnessed them produced in 
almost every instance in which I have applied such 
an instrument. The respiratory movements in parti- 
cular, when the subject thinks of a number, or hears 
the beats of the metronome, can change rhythm ; 
further, according as the experiment is prolonged, the 
movements increase progressively in intensity. 

After these few preliminary remarks, I have now 
only to bring before the eyes of my readers the tracings 

that I have taken with the patient P. S , and 

which are reproduced, with necessary explanations, 
on the accompanying pages. 

These tracings were all taken, without interruption, 
in the course of a single experiment, and without any 
alteration having been made in the apparatus, which re- 
mained in its place. A myographic drum was applied 
to each forearm. It will be remembered that the right 

side of P. S is insensible ■ the comparison of the 

reactions produced in both sides of the body can 
accordingly serve for showing the influence of anaes- 
thesia upon the so-called automatic movements. 



THE EMPLOYMENT OF THE GRAPHIC METHOD. 



53 




Fig. i. — Experiment with P. S , hemianaesthetical, on the right side. 

The first line traced, beginning at the top, represents the voluntary contrac- 
tions of the right, insensible arm. The second line traced represents the 
voluntary contractions of the left, sensible arm. Both were taken at the same 
time. The third line represents the automatic movements of the right, in- 
sensible arm during the beats of a metronome ; the fourth line corresponds 
to the left, sensible arm during the same experiment. The fifth tracing rep- 
resents the automatic movements of the right, insensible arm while the sub- 
ject is thinking of the number 5 ; the sixth line corresponds to the left, sensible 
arm during the same experiment. The lines are to be read from left to right. 
Minimum velocity of cylinder. 



54 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

We begin by asking the subject to press both hands 
energetically, then to open them, his eyes all the while 
being closed ; we thus obtain the two fir^t lines of the 
first figure ; the first line belongs to the right, anaes- 
thetic arm, and the second to the left, sensible arm ; 
we may collect therefrom the following differences : the 
movement of the anaesthetic hand is behind that of the 
other hand ; the height of the curve is less ; the line 
of ascension is more inclined.* 

Now, let us ask the subject to make no movement 
whatever, to remain completely immobile, and to listen 
attentively to the beats of a metronome : the third line 
traced, of the figure, corresponds to the right, anaes- 
thetic arm, which, without the knowledge of the sub- 
ject, executes clearly-defined movements, in rhythmic 
adaption to the beats of the metronome; in the fourth 
line, on the contrary, which corresponds to the left, 
sensible member, scarcely an} T thing is produced. 

Let us stop the metronome, and ask the subject to 
remain very quiet and, with both eyes closed, to think 
of the number 5. The right hand then begins, without 
the knowledge of the subject, to perform movements 
very clearly indicated in the fifth tracing of our first 
figure, while the left, sensible hand remains almost 
immobile, as shown by the sixth and last line marked. 

Accordingly, the first figure shows us, with per- 
fect evidence, that if the two, sensible and insensible, 

arms, of P. S be explored at the same time, the 

voluntary contractions will be stronger in the sensible 
member, and the automatic contractions, or those of 
the second personality, stronger in the anaesthetic 
member. This result, which we have similarly ob- 

*On this point, I may refer to my last publication : Les Movements volon- 
taires dans V Anesthesie hysterique. Revue Philosophique, 1889. 



THE EMPLOYMENT OF THE GRAPHIC METHOD. 55 

tained with another subject, appears to uphold the 
conclusion that the second personality has chosen, as 
the seat of its operation, the insensible regions of the 
body. . 

This result, we once more remark, is obtained only 
when we make simultaneously a bilateral exploration. 
Other tracings, which we have deemed unnecessary to 
publish, clearly show that the automatic contractions 
of the sensible member are very much stronger when 
no apparatus is during the same time applied to the 
other arm. In this case, as a matter of fact, the second 
personality brings its attention especially to bear upon 
the region of the body where the experiment is being 
made ; whereas, if it is obliged in some way, to concern 
itself with both arms at the same time, it prefers to 
take charge of the movements of the anaesthetic 
arm. This common comparison is employed in order 
to render a highly delicate fact clearly intelligible. It 
is certain that what we designate by a convenient term 
the second personality, is a complex synthesis of psy- 
chological elements, and that this synthesis, according 
to circumstances, is now constructed, now destroyed, 
now enlarged, and now diminished. It is understand- 
able, how attention, practice, and repetition can aid 
the development of this synthesis ; which is the case, 
when, in proportion as the experiment is protracted, 
the movements become more and more extended. 
This fact, moreover, can be observed with the majority 
of the lines traced, by running over them from left to 
right, in the directions in which they have been recorded. 

Such are the many important facts bearing upon 
the psychological history of the double personality ; 
and these facts are to be accurately ascertained only by 
the regular application of the graphic method. 



56 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 




Fig. 2.— Experiment upon P. S , hemianaesthetic, on the right side. 

Lines 1 and 2 are a repetition of the experiment recorded by lines 1 and 2 of 
the first figure. Line 3 corresponds to voluntary contractions of the right, 
anaesthetic arm after paralysis of the left, at first sensible, arm. Line 4 cor- 
responds to the left, paralyzed arm. Line 5 represents the automatic move- 
ments of the right arm, and -line 6, taken at the same time, represents the 
automatic movements of the paralyzed left arm, while the patient is listening 
to the beats of the metronome. The lines are to be read from left to right. 
Minimum velocity of cylinder. 



THE EMPLOYMENT OF THE GRAPHIC METHOD. 57 

This method contains still another lesson for us. 
Glance at the figures 2 and 3. The lines traced were 
taken, during the same experiment of course, after 
having effected by suggestion a paralysis of move- 
ment and of sensibility in the left half of the body, 
which was previously sensible and capable of move- 
ment. The changes produced at once strike the eye. 

Beginning at the top, the two first lines of figure 2 
are taken before the experiment of suggestion. The 
first line is produced by the voluntary contractions of 
the right, anaesthetic hand, and the second line by the 
simultaneous voluntary contractions of the left, sen- 
sible hand. It is the repetition, pure and simple, of 
the two first lines of the first figure. Then intervenes 
the suggestion producing paralysis. When the para- 
lysis of the left member is complete, the subject is 
again asked to squeeze strongly his two fists ; the vol- 
untary contractions of the right arm have increased in 
energy; those of the left, anaesthetic arm are scarcely 
perceptible, and, furthermore, they are behind, as will 
be seen from a comparison of lines 3 and 4 of fig. 2. 
Now we set our metronome a going. The auto- 
matic movements of the right member remain almost 
what they were before the experiment of paralysis (line 
5 of fig. 2, and line 1 of fig. 3); by way of compensa- 
tion, however, those of the left member which were 
imperceptible before the experiment when the member 
was sensible and capable of movement, become very 
distinct (line 6 of fig. 2, and line 2 of fig. 3). Simi- 
larly, when the subject thinks of the number 3, the 
movements are at the same time considerable in the 
right, anaesthetic member (line 3, fig. 3) and in the 
left, anaesthetic member (line 4, fig. 3). 

If we seek to collect the signification of these trac- 



58 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS.* 




Fig. 3. — Experiment with P. S , hemianaesthetic, on the right side. 

Lines 1 and 2 are a repetition of the experiment recorded by the tracings 5 
and 6 of the second figure. Line 3 corresponds to the automatic movements 
of the right arm while the subject is thinking of the number 3. Line 4, taken 
simultaneously, corresponds to the automatic movements of the left, paralyzed 
arm. Lines 5 and 6 were taken after the suppression of the paralysis and 
while the subject was listening to the beats of the metronome ; line 5 corre- 
sponds to the right, anassthetic arm, and line 6 to the left arm, again become 
sensible. The lines are to be read from left to right. Minimum velocity of 
cylinder. 



THE EMPLOYMENT OF THE GRAPHIC METHOD. 59 

ings, we shall see, in effect, that when suggestion has 
stricken the left member with paralysis, which pre- 
viously continued sensible, two simultaneous facts are 
produced : its voluntary activity has diminished in in- 
tensity, to the extent that the voluntary contractions 
are hardly perceptible, and at the same time its au- 
tomatic activity has increased correspondingly, as 
though there were a sort of antagonism between the 
tvo functions. In other words, by creating anaesthesia 
through suggestion in a region of the body, the province 
of the second personality has been extended. 

But it is curious to remark that the field of action 
of this second personality is always limited ; it cannot 
simultaneously produce movements equally precise 
in the right' and left members. For instance, when 
the subject thinks of the number 3, one arm will bet- 
ter express by its movements the figure thought of, 
than the other (of. line 3 and 4 of fig. 3); as if the at- 
tention of the second personality could not be brought 
to bear at the same time upon both arms. This is an- 
other circumstance that the graphic method alone 
could reveal. 

We shall confine ourselves to these few summary 
observations. It is not our intention to linger over 
the detailed description of experimental facts, but only 
to point out the principle of a new method adapted to 
the scientific study of automatic writing and analogous 
phenomena. It is much to be desired that those who 
have occasion to study automatic writing in normal 
persons, or in those who pretend to be such, will sub 
ject the movements performed by these individuals to 
the control of the graphic method. 



60 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



THE INTENSITY OF SUB-CONSCIOUS STATES. 



In this new chapter of our study of the doubling of 
consciousness I propose to enter upon an exceedingly 
delicate problem, and one that is of the greatest im- 
portance to psychology. At the Paris Congress of 
Physiological Psychology recently, I raised a discus- 
sion upon the subject in question, and for the benefit 
of the readers of this review, I now desire again to 
set forth the opinion I hold and the experiments I 
have instituted ; at the same time profiting by the va- 
rious remarks and objections that have been addressed 
to me by other physiologists. 

The problem that I seek to solve is, to understand 
how and why in hysterical patients a division of con 
sciousness takes place. Not to present the question in 
too abstract a form, I shall recall to mind a few ex- 
periments that once again may better convey the idea 
of what this so-called doubling of consciousness 
really is. 

We have repeatedly seen that in hysterical anaes- 
thesia sensation is preserved and may reappear in a 
secondary consciousness, distinct from the principal 
consciousness. The observations that we have hitherto 
published related to the sense of touch. We showed, 
in this way, that an anaesthetic hand, hidden behind a 
screen, would take a pen or pair of scissors, which had 
been brought into contact with it, and with these 



THE INTENSITY OF SUBCONSCIOUS STATES. 6l 

several objects would perform various intelligent move- 
ments ; which proved not only that the contact of the 
objects in question had been perceived, but that even 
their nature and functions had been recognized. To 
these observations we are now able to add still others, 
which show, that also the sensation of pain may be 
preserved. Two subjects I observed revealed in one 
half of their bodies a total insensibility to punctures, 
pressure, burning, — in short, to the most varied kinds 
of painful sensations ; but when we put a lighted 
match into the anaesthetic hand, the fingers would 
draw back from the flame in proportion as the latter 
advanced, and would finally relax, allowing the match 
to faM to the ground. Pain caused by burning, accord- 
ingly, is actually felt in an apparently anaesthetic limb ; 
there even existed, it seemed, a certain prevision of 
pain and corresponding defensive movements; yet all 
this did not reach the principal consciousness of the 
subject ; the sensations and movements of the anaes- 
thetic limb, by grouping themselves together, formed a 
secondary consciousness, which in its development did 
not amalgamate with the main consciousness. I must 
add, that, according to my own experience, it is less 
easy to impress on the anaesthetic regions a sensation 
of pain than a sensation of touch ; with most subjects 
the anaesthetic hand which is able to adjust itself in 
adaptation to familiar objects, does not seem to feel the 
sensation of pain caused by a burning match, and 
does not perform any defensive movement to avoid it. 
I trust that the details given in regard to the divi- 
sion of consciousness in hysterical subjects, will suffice 
to impart a perceptible form to the problem that we 
are endeavoring to solve. That problem is, to find out 
why sensations provoked in an anaesthetic region do 



62 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

not reach the principal consciousness of the patient; 
indeed, our wonder is all the greater that the sensa- 
tions in question should be perceived by another ego, 
and should provoke appropriate movements. In other 
words, the question we ask is, what are the psycho- 
physiological conditions that determine the formation 
of a second consciousness ? Having put the question 
before the reader, we shall, for the sake of greater 
clearness, at once point out the solution we propose. 
It is a matter of observation, as we shall ^presently 
show, that if among sensations belonging to the same 
organ of sense, (for example, to touch or to sight,) 
some belong to one consciousness and others to a dif- 
ferent consciousness, there will exist among such sen- 
sations a difference of intensity. We are unable in 
cases of hemi-anaesthesis to demonstrate this fact di- 
rectly ; for it is utterly impossible to compare with 
one another, from the point of view of intensity, the 
tactile sensations of any two, sensible and insen- 
sible, parts of a body; because each of the conscious- 
nesses knows but one of these two groups of sensa- 
tions. We may, however, take a roundabout way, 
and resort to an artifice based upon the following fact, 
that in cases in which the hysterical patient presents 
an approximatively regular hemi-anaesthesis, the or- 
gans of sense situated in the insensible half will share 
the anaesthesis to a less degree than the skin will ; thus, 
the eye may reveal a loss of the perception of cer- 
tain colors, or a concentrical contraction of the nor- 
mal field of colors. It is, accordingly, possible to in- 
stitute comparative experiments upon the sensibility 
of the healthy eye, and likewise upon that of the eye 
on the anaesthetic side, with the view of ascertaining 
whether the sensations caused in both eyes by a same 



THE INTENSITY OF SUBCONSCIOUS STATES. 63 

excitant exhibit differences of quality or of intensity. 
The two following experiments seem to furnish an an- 
swer to this question. 

M. Charpentier has demonstrated, that a minimum 
of perceptible color exists, depending upon the extent 
of the stimulated part of the retina. The same fact 
is verified in the hysterical patient, yet on a much ex- 
aggerated scale, for in order that an hysterical person 
may be able to perceive a color, the colored surface 
must be larger than is required for the normal eye. 
Now, it is highly important to be able to establish that 
the chromatic minimum is not the same for both eyes. 
Let us take an example. To perform the experiments, 
it is not necessary to employ pure colors, since the 
main fact of importance lies in the comparison of the 
two eyes. Thus, in the case of Dem . . . . , a hemi- 
ansesthetical patient on the right side, a piece of red 
paper, to be perceived as such by the right ansesthet- 
ical eye, had to be at least six millimetres square, 
while in the case of the left eye two millimetres square 
is a sufficient size. It is thus seen that the quantity 
of excitation necessary for the production of the sen- 
sation of red is not the same for both eyes. This is 
not a matter of interpretation, but the actual fact 
itself; whence, it appears, we may conclude with a 
certain degree of probability, that if to both eyes we 
apply one and the same excitant, the sensation pro- 
duced on the sensible side will possess a greater in- 
tensity than that produced on the ansesthetical side.* 

A second experiment, likewise performed upon the 
sense of vision, yields a result which, in my opinion, 

*M. Parinaud, director of the opthalmoscopic department at the " Sal- 
petriere," has verified the same fact in a slightly different form. (Anesthesie 
de la retine, Bruxelles, 1886.) 



64 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

leads to an analogous interpretation. We know that 
when we present simultaneously to each of both eyes 
two surfaces representing different colors, there is pro- 
voked what is called a conflict, an antagonism of the 
visual field. If, for example, we present to the right 
eye a red back-ground, and to the left eye a green 
one, the observer will perceive a field which seems 
alternately red and green. I have attempted to repro- 
duce this experiment with hysterical subjects, by em- 
ploying certain colored glasses, that have kindly been 
lent me by M. Ch. Henry. I have used only glasses 
the color of which my patients could perceive with 
both eyes. In hemi-anaesthetic hysterical subjects, 
submitted to my investigation, I have established the 
fact, that there is not produced a concurrence of the 
visual fields, as in normal individuals ; the color placed 
before the eye of the sensible side is the only one 
perceived. If, for example, into the frame of a pair 
of spectacles we insert a red glass and a green glass, 
which are almost complementary and, when super- 
posed, extinguish each other, the subject will only 
perceive the color of the glass placed before the eye of 
greater sensibility ; he thus only perceives red in the 
one instance, and green in the other. Like the former 
example, this new experiment seems to me to demon- 
strate, that, given an equal degree of excitation, the 
sensations of the sensible eye will present a greater 
intensity than those of the anaesthetic eye. 

This conclusion might be further strengthened by 
researches that I have recently made with reference to 
the times of reaction in visual excitations. The times 
are longer when the excitation is performed upon the 
anaesthetic eye ; which seems again to prove, that the 
sensation of this eye, for any one excitation, is of a 



THE INTENSITY OF SUBCONSCIOUS STATES. 6=J 

less intensity than that of the sensible eye. M. Fere 
has made observations on the times of reaction to tac- 
tile excitations, in cases of incomplete anaesthesias of 
the skin, and has obtained similar results. 

In the researches of which I have just given a con- 
densed exposition, we have hitherto compared the 
sensations produced in a sensible region and those 
produced in an anaesthetic region from the point of 
view of intensity only. If the conclusion derived — 
although provisorily — from these first researches is cor- 
rect, we ought to be able to generalize it, and to as- 
sume in advance, that if we progressively diminish the 
intensity of an excitant that acts upon the more sen- 
sible organ, there must arrive a point at which the 
sensation is sufficiently diminished in intensity as no 
longer to form a part of the secondary consciousness, 
but become sub-conscious, as are the sensations of the 
anaesthetic regions. 

And experiments, indeed, completely confirm this 
prediction. Here again we are by preference referred 
to visual excitants, in order, as far as possible, to 
obtain precise and mensurable results. 

We have, in fact, already discussed the experiment 
required, in our study of the hysterical eye, — for which 
see page 30 et seqq. We have seen, that if we place 
an hysterical person before a graduated scale of let- 
ters, the writing of the insensible hand, unknown to 
the subject, is able to reproduce diminutive letters that 
the subject himself cannot see. Now, it is easy to es- 
tablish here, that a difference of intensity exists between 
the sensations forming part of the two consciousnesses. 

The word intensity, I well know, has, when applied 
to sensations, a rather uncertain sense. But we call 
attention to the fact, that the intensity of visual sen- 



66 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

sation here corresponds to an objective fact, suscep- 
tible of measurement — the size, namely, of the retinal 
image; and all things being otherwise equal, it is al- 
lowable to say, that to the largest retinal image cor- 
responds the most intense visual sensation. Now, just 
as when we diminish the retinal image — through the 
choice of ever smaller letters — a point arrives where 
the size of the image becomes insufficient to allow of 
reading, but nevertheless is sufficient to determine au- 
tomatic writing, it is manifest, that the principal dif- 
ference existing in this case between the sensations of 
the two consciousnesses, is a difference of intensity. 

This second series of experiments reaches, we see, 
the same conclusion as the former. We shall pres- 
ently expound still others, which belong to an entirely 
different order. 

Among the most curious and important facts that 
have recently been discovered in the domain of phys- 
iological psychology, we must mention the phenomena 
of dynamogeny, as produced in hyperexcitable sub- 
jects under the influence of peripheral excitations, 
that is to say, of sensations of every kind. M. Fere, 
who long has studied these dynamogenetic actions of 
sensations, has demonstrated that they make them- 
selves felt not only upon the movements, but upon the 
sensibility, upon circulation and the other physiolog- 
ical functions.* 

These psycho-mechanical experiments can furnish 
a fresh argument in support of the thesis we advance ; 
showing, that if the sensations we provoke in an 
anaesthetic limb, do not reach as far as the principal 
consciousness of the subject, it is caused by lack of 
intensity. In fact, when we subject the limb or the in- 

* Sensation et Mouvement. Paris : Felix Alcan. 



THE INTENSITY OF SUBCONSCIOUS STATES. 67 

sensible region to the influence of a dynamogenetic 
agent, as a magnet or to electricity, the sensations pro- 
voked in this limb become conscious according as the 
power of dynamometric pressure is increased ; there 
is, accordingly, probably produced the same augmen- 
tation of intensity in the psycho-sensorial process, as 
in the psycho- motory process. 

If there remained any doubt in regard to the pre- 
ceding interpretation, such doubts, I trust, would be 
destroyed by the recital of a somewhat complex exper- 
iment upon the visual organ, which I have performed 

upon several patients, and notably with L. L . Let 

us again place this subject before the black-board with 
its scale of written letters. The patient's visual acu- 
ity, as previously stated, is equal to 0-5 : the visual 
acuity, revealed by the automatic writing, is a trifle 
higher, it is equal to 075. If, while the subject is at- 
tempting to decipher the letters, we subject him to a 
dynamogenetic excitation, such as a simple pressure 
upon the anaesthetic hand, the visual acuity of the con- 
scious subject increases, it becomes equal to 075, 
and, consequently, equal to that which guides the au- 
tomatic writing. We are able to interpret this first 
result by asserting, that peripheral excitation renders 
conscious to the principal subject certain visual sen- 
sations, in that it augments their intensity. 

But the most curious fact that occurs in this ex- 
periment is the following. This same dynamogenetic 
excitation exerts its influence upon the visual acuity 
that is in connection with the automatic writing. The 
measurement of this visual acuity shows even, that it 
can become equal to unity, namely, to that of a normal 
eye ; the acuity of conscious perception remains less, 
and only attains 075. 



68 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

It is really interesting to note, that a given periph- 
eral excitation, which suffices to provoke automatic 
writing, is not competent to provoke the conscious 
perception of the principal ego. In other words, a 
degree of sensorial intensity sufficient to provoke au- 
tomatic writing, does not suffice to provoke conscious 
perception ; which proves once again, that there exists 
a difference of intensity between the psychological phe- 
nomena of the two consciousnesses. 

All the experiments above expounded are sus- 
ceptible of a very simple counter-proof. Up to this 
point we have seen, that in most cases we are able to 
render a sensation sub-conscious, by diminishing the 
quantity of excitation, or, inversely, to render a sen- 
sation conscious by augmenting the quantity of exci- 
tation. We have not operated directly upon the ele- 
ment of consciousness. 

Hypnotic suggestion enables us to modify this ele- 
ment, to suppress it when it exists, or to create it, when 
it is lacking. By this means we are able to ascertain 
whether the conscious phenomenon corresponds to a 
definitely determined degree of intensity of the phys- 
iological phenomenon that serves as its foundation. 
Upon this point, I have performed, in association with 
M. Fere, an experiment which seems to me decisive. 
The experiment in question was conducted with an 
hypnotisable, hysterical woman, who when she volun- 
tarily pressed the dynamometer in the state of rest in- 
dicated on it the number 20, and when she pressed 
the instrument while looking at a red-colored surface, 
the cipher 40. With this subject an hypnotic sugges- 
tion suppresses for a moment the conscious vision of 
the red. Again, invited to press the dynamometer, 
while looking at the red surface, which to the subject 



THE INTENSITY OF SUBCONSCIOUS STATES. 69 

seems grey, she no longer indicates 40, but a number 
slightly higher than her normal figure. This experi- 
ment demonstrates to us, that the suppression of con- 
sciousness is equivalent to a diminution of intensity in 
the corresponding physiological process. 

And this conclusion, which we have already reached 
a number of times, seems to me to deserve an earnest 
consideration ; but, in order to be well understood, it 
needs to be made precise. In short, the experiments 
that we have recapitulated only seem to prove one 
thing, viz. : that a sensation having been given, whether 
visual, tactile, auditive or other, if we diminish its in- 
tensity, it is no longer perceived by the principal con- 
sciousness, but may be discovered in a secondary 
consciousness. A difference of intensity, accordingly, 
can serve to explain how a tactile sensation a belongs 
to the first consciousness, and a tactile sensation b be- 
longs to the second. 

But, when the sensations are of a different class, 
this comparison of intensity becomes altogether in- 
sufficient. Thus, there are subjects who will perceive 
an electric current in a member where they have lost 
the sensation of mechanical pressure, or of puncture, 
of heat, or of cold. Evidently we cannot explain this 
disassociation by saying that electric sensation is more 
intense than other sensations, because frequently the 
very subjects that are insensible to the strongest punc- 
tures, are able to feel even the faintest galvanic current, 
and moreover no standard of comparison is really pos- 
sible between things that are so widely different. But 
let us call attention to the fact, that if the explanation 
we have proposed, encounters at this point a limit, — a 
fact which merely proves that it is not general, — never- 
theless, we are able to establish that the notion of 



70 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

quantity and of intensity maintains its importance, 
even in experiments of the kind referred to. There 
are, in fact, many hysterical subjects who do not per- 
ceive the electrical excitation at the first instant it is 
applied to the insensible skin ; but if the excitation is 
continued for a few moments, it most frequently hap- 
pens that sensibility to the electrical current will be 
aroused under the form of a painful sensation ; which 
proves beyond question, that a certain quantity of 
electrical excitation is needed in order to arouse con- 
scious sensation, and that quality is not the paramount 
factor. 

In conclusion I shall emphasize a psychological 
aspect, which appears to me of a certain importance.* 
I do not believe that a difference of intensity between 
two sensations of the same sense ipso facto justifies 
their distribution into two different consciousnesses. 
It is further necessary, that the sensation, however 
faint, should not possess an interest, a practical im- 
portance that might attract the attention of the sub- 
ject, and by that very fact augment the intensity of 
the sensation in question. 

The hysterical subject, as I, with many other ob- 
servers, conceive him, is an exhausted subject. The 
slightest effort is painful to him, and he thus seeks to 
husband his forces. Like all of us, he experiences a 
vast number of sensations, differing both in their inten- 
sity and quality. He makes a selection from among all 
these sensations, because he finds.it too fatiguing to 
perceive them all. Generally speaking, he more care- 
fully preserves visual sensations than tactile sensa- 
tions, because he can less easily dispense with the 

* M. Pierre Janet, a. propos of my communication to the Paris Congress 
had advanced an opinion which closely agrees with the one I set forth. 



THE INTENSITY OF SUBCONSCIOUS STATES. 7 I 

former ; and in a given order of sensations, he pre- 
serves the most intense sensations, because the latter 
are perceived with the least effort of adaptation of the 
sensory organ. Such, in my opinion, is the rather in- 
direct role of the intensity of sensation in the division 
of consciousness.' 

It is because feeble sensations are difficult to collect 
and to arrange, because they exact greater attention 
and greater effort, that the subject neglects them and 
that they form secondary consciousnesses. The divi- 
sion of consciousness, it seems to me, is chiefly ex- 
plainable by the mental habitudes peculiar to the in- 
dividual. 



ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



THE ROLE OF SUGGESTION IN PHENOMENA 
OF DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



We shall conclude our investigation of the subject 
of double consciousness, by attempting to define ac- 
curately the relations existing between the phenom- 
ena treated of and those of suggestion. The subject 
of suggestion has been extensively and carefully studied, 
of late years, in France. At the present day, the facts 
of this department are the best known and the least 
discussed. They are daily reproduced in our hospitals 
upon subjects of the most diverse characters ; and 
they will undoubtedly soon take their place in the cur- 
rent practice of medicine. Some writers, of a type of 
mind too prone to generalization, have exaggerated 
the importance of suggestion, and are determined to 
find suggestion at every turn ; they have asserted even, 
that suggestion is the sole cause and key of all phys- 
ical and moral phenomena capable of being provoked 
in hypnotized subjects. 

Owing to repeated experiments, it is comparatively 
easy to give a fairly precise definition of suggestion ; 
and such a definition is absolutely necessary if we de- 
sire to avoid the error committed by many writers who 
have come to explain everything by suggestion only 
because they confound under this convenient term 
things that are quite different. First of all, suggestion 
implies, in the majority of cases, the setting into ac- 



SUGGESTION IN DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 73 

tivity of the intellect of the subject ; it is pre-eminently 
a psychological phenomenon. When a hypnotized sub- 
ject, for example, is told that there is a snake or a 
bird in front of him, and when, following thereupon, 
he fancies he sees a serpent crawling at his feet, or a 
bird flying in the air, this constitutes a suggestion, 
for, to provoke the hallucination, an appeal has been 
made to the intellect of the patient. The same result 
may be reached without making use of words to con- 
vey to the subject the thought in question : oftentimes 
a simple gesture, a sign, an attitude, or even the form 
of the experiment, are sufficient to apprise the subject 
of what the experimenter wishes ; and the thought that 
the latter has in mind is often hit upon and carried 
into execution by the subject with a rapidity and a sa- 
gacity that are astonishing. In this phenomenon we 
come upon one of the greatest obstacles and one of 
the most easily committed errors attending psycholog- 
ical experiments with hypnotized subjects. 

A second feature of suggestion, at least in the ma- 
jority of cases, is the assumption of an influence exerted 
by one person upon another. The subject of the sug- 
gestion is at the orders of the experimenter ; he listens, 
he appropriates the latter's thought, he feels every- 
thing the experimenter desires him to feel, obeys every 
wish and every caprice the experimenter entertains. 
The instances of resistance offered, frequently met 
with, are evidence of incomplete hypnotization or of 
incomplete suggestion. Of the observations that firmly 
establish this passive obedience on the part of the sub- 
ject, I shall cite that of M. Richet which I deem very 
remarkable. The experiment was conducted with one 
of his friends, whom, after having been put to sleep, 
M. Richet compelled to pick up, twenty times in sue- 



74 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

cession, a piece of chalk that he kept throwing under 
the table. 

Such is what contemporary authors understand by 
suggestion. The notion currently entertained thereof 
may be explained by putting it into such a form as this, 
namely, that it is the setting into activity of the intel- 
lect of a subject by another person, who exerts upon 
the subject a power more or less absolute. 

I have no hesitation in declaring, for my part, that 
a definition of this sort is beyond question insufficient 
' and that it would be unsafe to accept it ; it is much 
too broac ; it comprehends too many facts ; it com- 
prises, in effect, all psychology, and on this score every 
psychological phenomenon becomes a phase of sug- 
gestion — a state of affairs that would divest words of 
their worth and complicate all questions involved. 
With a very few authors, among them M. Pierre Janet 
for example, I hold that we must restrict the term sug- 
gestion to cases, precisely determined, in which a sub- 
ject carries into effect a given phenomenon because he 
has previously had the idea of it. He has conceived the 
phenomenon, he has willed it, or at least he has given 
it his adhesion, and he carries it out. Such is sugges- 
tion. For example, we tell him to steal a handkerchief ; 
he understands what we require of him, and does it. 
Or perhaps, we tell him that his picture is drawn upon 
a sheet of white paper; he understands what is told 
him, he represents to himself the portrait and believes 
he sees it. In all these cases, we establish, when we 
analyze them, the fact that the subject is conscious of 
the end that he pursues and that the experimenter has 
indicated it to him. 

A psychologist will have no difficulty in recognizing 
that suggestion, understood in the sense last indicated, 



SUGGESTION IN DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 75 

pre-supposes a great number of intellectual elements. 
It appeals, in the first place, to the functions of per- 
ception, then to the functions of ideation, of compre- 
hension ; the entire intelligence can, in certain cases, 
intervene in the shape of reasoning, of memory, and 
of imagination ; and finally, the will, the emotions, the 
entire personality of the subject may play a part in it, 
be it by engaging in the suggestion, be it through 
modifying the same, or in opposing it. Suggestion 
clearly represents an intellectual activity that is ex- 
tremely elevated and complex. 

But it is plain that all the manifestations of the 
mind can not be referred to a phenomenon of this 
kind, as type. Every one possesses, within the sphere 
of his psychological life, acts of a more simple, of a 
more elementary order ; and these more elementary 
acts must, in hypnotized subjects, plainly be retained. 
The following are instances of such acts. If some one 
sharply strike our knee, at the tendon just below the 
cap, while our legs are crossed, we will suddenly lift 
and extend the leg outward ; if a person, behind us, 
strike, unawares, a vigorous blow with a stick upon a 
Chinese gong, we will be stunned by the deafening 
sound for which we were unprepared, and will make a 
gesture of surprise or of fright, or we will give forth a 
cry. We have here, it may be said, elementary psy- 
chological phenomena ; which do not contain a trace 
of suggestion, for we have not had the idea or the in- 
tention of making a movement of our leg before receiv- 
ing the blow at the knee, or the idea of crying out be- 
fore having heard the noise made by the gong. Now 
the fact that these phenomena are produced in hyp- 
notized subjects is no reason that they should alter in 



y6 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

character, and we believe, accordingly, that suggestion 
does not comprehend all psychological phenomena. 

The reader is now well enough acquainted with the 
subject to understand why it is insufficient to explain 
everything that takes place in hypnotized subjects by 
invoking the hackneyed term suggestion. " Sugges- 
tion," people say. And that suffices for all purposes, 
that explains everything, and like the panacea of the 
ancients it cures everything. As a matter of fact, 
theories of suggestion, thus invoked, amount to noth- 
ing less than make-shifts to save people the trouble 
of serious and delicate investigation. 

We have now come to the especial subject of our 
inquiries. Without doubt, we shall find here sugges- 
tion ; but it is not suggestion that explains the divi- 
sion of consciousness in hysterical patients, at least the 
spontaneous division observable in persons affected 
with anaesthesia. Far from being the cause of the 
division of consciousness, it is its effect. This latter 
idea was first propounded by M. Pierre Janet, and ap- 
pears to me eminently correct. A word will suffice to 
elucidate it. 

Suggestion, when successful, consists of an idea 
impressed upon a person and reigning dominant in the 
consciousness of that person ; reason, critical powers, 
and will are impotent to restrain it. If a subject be- 
lieves he is holding a bird upon his knee, in conse- 
quence of the simple fact that I have told him so, the 
conclusion evidently is that he has lost the power of 
controlling, examining, and judging the ideas given 
him. For suggestion to develop itself, accordingly, it 
is necessary that the subject's field of consciousness do 
not contain too many antagonistic ideas. Now, it is 
exactly this psychological situation that is found realiz- 



SUGGESTION IX DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 77 

ed in the duplication of consciousness. As a conse- 
quence of such a phenomenon of bipartition, each of 
the consciousnesses occupies a more narrow and more 
limited field than if there existed one single conscious- 
ness containing all the ideas of the subject. This re- 
trenchment of the field of consciousness constitutes 
what is called suggestibility. 

We are able, to a certain extent, to test directly the 
exactitude of the interpretation indicated, by recur- 
ring anew to the experiments set forth in our previous 
articles. When an hysterical subject presents an 
anaesthesia of half of the body, the sensations received 
into that half form, as we have seen, a consciousness 
distinct from the principal consciousness. Now, in 
many subjects, this second consciousness appears to 
occupy a field of activity much more limited than the 
principal consciousness, for the suggestions given it 
are executed in a more automatic manner. For ex- 
ample, let us command the subject, that is to say, the 
principal consciousness, to take a pen and to write his 
name ; perhaps the subject will obey our injunction, 
but it is also possible that he will resist it, and that in 
the waking state he will be very slightly susceptible 
to suggestion ; the field of his consciousness includes 
a certain number of antagonistic ideas against which 
a struggle must ensue, and over which victory is not 
always certain. But the case is quite different when, 
without saying a word to the subject, we slip a pen 
into his anaesthetic hand, and make him trace a word 
behind a screen ; the anaesthetic hand, in the majority 
of subjects, does not hesitate to re-write the word ; in- 
deed, it will write it successively a great many times 
— proving the limited power of initiative of the impov- 
erished consciousness that receives the sensations of 



y8 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

the anaesthetic member. This incessant repetition of 
the same graphical movement has been discovered in 
several pathological cases, and the name of "verbige- 
ration " has been given it. This absence of the power 
of initiative action is indeed so great that in the major- 
ity of subjects that I have studied, a suggestion of con- 
duct or action through the intermediary agency of the 
anaesthetic hand could not possibly be effected. If 
we cause to be written by the anaesthetic hand the 
orders " Cough," "Sing," " Get up," the hand will 
reproduce automatically the order written, but the act 
suggested will not be carried into execution. This 
circumstance shows us that the phenomena of auto- 
matic imitation constitute an inferior psychological 
life. 

M. Pierre Janet, whom I have frequently cited — 
for he has pushed his investigations very far upon this 
particular question and his conclusions often coincide 
with my own — has discovered an interesting method 
of utilizing this especial suggestibility produced by the 
division of consciousness. Although I have no inclin- 
ation, on this occasion, to occupy myself with anything 
that relates to the practice of medicine, I may neverthe- 
less point out that our researches in the province 
of psychology may in case of necessity possess a very 
great advantage for patients and contribute greatly to 
the treatment of their diseases. 

Up to this point I have investigated only that divi- 
sion of consciousness that is spontaneous, that pre- 
exists in subjects before any sort of experiment is in- 
stituted. M. Janet has invented an ingenious means 
of effecting an artificial division ; it consists in distract- 
ing the attention of the subject while some one is talk- 
ing to him. For example, we take advantage of a 



SUGGESTION IN DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 79 

moment when the subject is chatting with some other 
person, or is absorbed perhaps in a fascinating book, 
to talk to him in a low voice ; whereupon a mental 
bipartition is produced ; one part of the subject's mind 
is conversing with the first-mentioned person, and 
another part with the second. Two distinct conscious- 
nesses are thus formed, and each one is wholly occu- 
pied with the task before it. The suggestions that can 
be induced in this manner in a subject divided by 
distraction, are much more efficacious than direct sug- 
gestions ; they have, in addition, the advantage of 
being capable of accomplishment without it being 
necessary to put the subject to sleep, and we warmly 
recommend this class to all those who seek to alleviate 
the diseases of hysterical patients. 



So ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS IN HEALTH. 4 



The preceding experiments have been made with 
hysterical 'subjects'. It has seemed to me useful to 
try if I could obtain analogous results in subjects that 
are normal — or nearly so, for, of course, the normal 
type has only an ideal existence. It is certain that, if 
we succeed in seizing in a healthy individual the least 
degree of the phenomena of duplication which are so 
developed in the hysterical, a solid basis will be given 
to the psychological study of double consciousness ; 
each observer being put in a position to check all the 
facts advanced. I have made my investigations on 
five persons, who have been kind enough to submit 
themselves patiently to very long, very minute, and 
very monotonous experiments. So that, proceeding 
from the results obtained and set forth in the forego- 
ing pages, we shall now endeavor to find out whether 
the phenomena of the duplication of consciousness are 
to be met with in non-hysterical subjects. 

The persons on whom I have experimented are 
two ladies of fifty, a lady of thirty, and two of twenty- 
five years of age. One lady of fifty is ataxical ; the lady 
of thirty is decidedly anaemic ; otherwise, all of them 
enjoy good health. They have little intellectual cul- 

* This article first appeared in Mind, No. LVII, from which with the 
permission of the publishers it has been reprinted. 



DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS IN HEALTH. 8t 

ture, are completely ignorant of the aim of the experi- 
ments, and know, of course, nothing of researches on 
double consciousness or the like. I sat with each of 
them, on an average, six times, for three-quarters of 
an hour. The phenomena became gradually more 
marked, and without doubt would become still more 
so if the treatment were pushed farther. Lately I 
have attended to the question whether suggestible 
persons present a narrowing of the field of conscious- 
ness, that is to say, a difficulty in occupying themselves 
with several things at a time.* I think I may answer 
that it is not so with those of my subjects who present 
the most developed automatic phenomena ; in fact, 
they can do at k the same time very complicated things, 
for example, perform a mental addition, and squeeze, 
in series of five or six pressures, an india-rubber tube 
connected with a registering apparatus. I shall return 
to this question later on. 

A word, first of all, on the experimental conditions 
selected. When experiments are made on an hyster- 
ical subject with an insensitive limb, it is relatively 
easy to submit that limb to excitations of which the 
subject has no consciousness. If, for example, it is 
the arm of the subject that is insensible, this is 
placed behind a screen, the skin is excited without the 
subject's perceiving the excitation, and the move- 
ments — often very intelligent — which the hand and 
the forearm execute in response to that excitation are 
produced outside the consciousness of the subject, and 
prove consequently that there exists in the subject a 
second consciousness. 

But when the subject of the experiments has not 
the least insensibility, it is necessary to change the 

* Pierre Janet, D Automatisme psychologique, p. 456. 



82 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

method. If his hand, placed behind the screen, is 
touched, he feels that it is touched, and the move- 
ment by which he responds to this sensation is equally 
conscious ; there is no double consciousness there. 
To evoke double consciousness, it is therefore neces- 
sary to render the subject insensible to the excitations 
brought to bear upon his limb, and, for that purpose, 
to distract him by occupying him otherwise ; distrac- 
tion, as M. Pierre Janet has well shown, being a trans- 
itory anaesthesia. 

I therefore requested my subjects — to whom, of 
course, no explanation was given of what was going 
to be done — to seat themselves before a table and 
leave their right hands to me, while I gave them 
something interesting to read. In these conditions 
one fact first showed itself which is worthy of remark. 
If the hand of one of my subjects was pricked while she 
was reading attentively, the sensation was less well 
perceived than when the subject, without looking at 
her hand, was told that she was going to be pricked and 
was prepared to receive the sensation ; for example, 
the separation necessary for the two points of a com- 
pass to be felt as double was greater in the first case. 
This, then, is anaesthesia by distraction ; it is fugitive, 
passing deceptive, — but it exists. 

I could render it stronger by means of an artifice. 
Provoking different movements in the limb experi- 
mented on, I requested the subject to execute no 
movement, to leave her hand, for example, completely 
motionless and relaxed, and at the same time made 
her believe that it was I who, by slight pushes on the 
pencil or on the hand, made the latter move. Thanks 
to this little deception, the subject would pay no at- 
tention to those slight movements of her hand, but 



DOUBLE COXSCIOUSXESS IN HEALTH. S3 

attribute them to the experimenter. Evidently these 
(very delicate) psychological conditions will vary from 
one subject to another ; but for the moment we need 
take no account of the variations. 

One of the experiments it appeared to me easiest 
to effect was that of the repetition of passive move- 
ments. A pencil being placed in the hand of the sub- 
ject, who was attentively reading a journal, I made 
the hand trace a uniform movement, choosing that 
which it executes with most facility, for example, 
shadings or curls or little dots. Having communicated 
these movements for some minutes, I left the hand to 
itself quite gently ; the hand continued the movement 
a little. After three or four experiments the repeti- 
tion of the movement became more perfect, and, with 

Mile. G , for example, at the fourth sitting the 

repetition was so distinct that the hand traced as 
many as eighty curls without stopping. 

It is for the experimenter to choose with each sub- 
ject the easiest kind of movement. I find that in gen- 
eral those movements are easiest that can be executed 
with a continous stroke. 

In the first experiments, when the hand had been 
successfully habituated to repeating a certain kind of 
movement — for example, curls — it was to this kind of 
movement that it had a tendency to return. If it was 
made to trace the figure i a hundred times and was 
afterwards left to itself, the stroke of the figure became 
rapidly modified, and turned into a curl. This shows 
well how rudimentary, as yet, was the motor memory 
that was being developed. 

When any kind of movement had been well re- 
peated, it could be reproduced without solicitation 
every time a pen was put in the subject's hand and 



84 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

she fixed her attention on reading. But if the sub- 
ject thought attentively of her hand, the movement 
stopped. 

I have selected graphic movements because they 
are sufficiently delicate to be produced without awak- 
ening the attention of the subject, whereas move- 
ments of flexion and extension impressed upon the 
fingers or the wrist would with difficulty pass unper- 
ceived at the beginning of the experiments. 

Movements of flexion and extension can never- 
theless be developed, and I have ascertained that it is 
easier to get a total movement of the wrist repeated 
automatically than an isolated movement of flexion of 
one of the fingers. 

When these movements of repetition become very 
distinct, they may come to be generalized and to 
appear in the other limb. 

A second observation relates to the influence which 
the contact of the experimenter exercises on the hand 
experimented on. With a slight pressure I was able 
to make the hand go obediently in all directions, car- 
rying the pen with it. This is not a simple mechanical 
compulsion, for a very feeble and very short contact 
is sufficient to bring on a very long movement of the 
hand. The phenomenon, I believe, can be approx- 
imated to a rudimentary suggestion by the sense of 
touch. Nothing is more curious than to see the hand 
of a person who is awake and thinks she is in full 
possession of herself implicitly obey the experi- 
menter's orders. In these conditions there appears 
to me to be a partial hypnotisation. 

It sometimes happens that the subject perceives 
these movements ; but the perception is much less 
distinct than in the normal state. You can assure 



DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS IN HEALTH. S5 

yourself of this by requesting the subject to describe 
exactly the movement she has been made to execute. 

The necessary condition for the preceding reactions 
is, that attention should not be fixed on the hand and 
what is taking place there. So far, I have realised 
this condition by making the subject attend to some- 
thing else, viz., reading, which is an intellectual oper- 
ation, having nothing in common with the excitations 
that produce manual movements. Thanks to this 
artifice, the excitations, — for example, the contact of 
the experimenter or the passive movement impressed, 
— produced their full and entire effect on the psycho- 
motor centres of the arm, without the attention and 
will of the subject interfering to modify the reac- 
ions. 

Curiously, this result can be attained by quite op- 
posite means. Instead of the attention of the subject 
being attracted elsewhere, it may be fixed on the par- 
ticular excitations that are to set going the psycho- 
motor mechanism of the hand. 

The following is the clearest example that I have 
been able to establish. Place a metronome before 
the subject and set it in motion. Let the subject 
be requested to listen with the greatest attention to 
the hard sharp sound of the metronome, while the 
hand holds a pen. Pretty rapidly you can habituate 
the hand of the subject to trace with the pen little 
strokes that follow the rhythm of the metronome. Some 
persons even attain to doing it spontaneously. 

In this experiment it is sufficient for the subject 
to listen with attention to the sound in order to cease 
to perceive the movements produced in the hand by 
the acoustic excitation. The excitation and the move- 
ment are nevertheless cause and effect. They are 



86 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

two elements of the same psycho-motor process ; and 
a priori it might have been thought that the attention 
fixed on one of these elements should naturally extend 
to those associated with it. 

Excitation of the movements of the hand may be 
produced not only by external sensations, but by ideas 
that strongly occupy the mind of the subject. If 
the subject thinks forcibly of a name or of a figure 
while holding a pen in the hand, and if the experi- 
menter himself holds the hand of the subject it hap- 
pens pretty often that the hand executes movements 
distinct enough for the experimenter to be able to di- 
vine his subject's thought. This is the phenomenon 
of automatic writing, which has been studied at length 
within the last years. I have nothing new to add, 
unless it be the remark that concentration of thought 
on a figure is sufficient to produce a state of distraction 
from the movements of the hand that is writing the 
figure. 

The experiment with the metronome gives occasion 
for a remark as to the effect of attention on the in- 
tensity of sensations. As long as the subject listens 
to the beats of the metronome, the rhythmical move- 
ments of the hand go on. They become much feebler 
and may even cease completely if the subject is re- 
quested not to listen any longer, but to think of some- 
thing else. This observation has already been made on 
hysterical subjects, and in much better conditions; for 
the rhythmic movements of the hysterical subject's in- 
sensible limb are, as we have seen, so considerable that 
they translate themselves, when the subject holds an 
india-rubber tube, into pressures on the tube. We were 
therefore able to register these movements by the 
graphic method ; and the tracings obtained show that 



DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS IN HEALTH. 87 

there is a great difference in the extent of the contrac- 
tions, according as the subject listens with attention 
to the sound of the metronome or tries not to hear it. 

This experiment on the hysterical, taken along 
with that which has just been described on healthy 
subjects, proves, in my opinion, that there is in us a 
power of augmenting the intensity of an excitation 
whenever we attend to it. Attention is comparable to 
will ; it is, in fact, nothing else than will directed to- 
wards the organs of the senses and the processes of 
ideation. Just as by the will we can stop a movement 
or augment its energy, so by attention we can weaken 
or augment the effect of a peripheral excitation. But 
I reserve the study of attention for another time. 

My aim here was simply to show that the rudi- 
ment of those states of double consciousness which we 
have studied first in the hysterical, may with a little 
attention be found in normal subjects. This result 
might have been inferred from the numerous observa- 
tions on automatic writing which have been made on 
subjects free from hysteria. Automatic writing is the 
best known of these facts of double consciousness ; but 
we have seen that it is not isolated. It is only one in a 
large class of phenomena, others being the repetition 
of communicated movements, suggestion by contact, 
insensibility by distraction, &c. All these phenomena, 
when brought together, throw light on one another 
and attest the formation of a centre of consciousness 
functioning independently of the common centre. My 
experiments appear to me to demonstrate that many 
normal subjects, if not all, are apt to have their 
psycho-motor centres thus disaggregated. 

Of course my experiments were not complicated 
enough to prove that the psycho-motor centres of the 



$8 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

hand and arm, which I have caused to act indepen- 
dently, are accompanied by states of consciousness, 
I have therefore not succeeded in demonstrating 
double consciousness in healthy as in hysterical sub- 
jects. I have only established the existence of the 
first degree of the phenomenon. 

Of the five subjects specially studied, I have only 
found one — a lady of fifty — who, in spite of repeated 
experiments, displayed neither automatic writing, nor 
suggestion of the hand by contact, nor automatic 
repetition of movements. The only fact observed 
with this lady is that, when she reads while holding a 
pen in the position necessary for writing, her right 
hand insensibly traces with the pen a straight line 
from left to right. I must add that she declares her- 
self almost incapable of attentively following her read- 
ing while experiments are being made on her hand ; 
her attention, in spite of every effort, goes with curios- 
ity to her hand and spies out all that is taking place 
there. 

The four other persons who submitted themselves 
to my researches displayed the phenomena of double 
consciousness. In two these phenomena were rudi- 
mentary ; in the two others they were very developed. 
According to their own evidence, these four subjects 
can fix their attention on their reading with sufficient 
force not to feel anything that is taking place in their 
hand. 

It seemed to me then that attention was an impor- 
tant condition of the success of my researches. Accord- 
ingly, I made the following experiment on my two best 
subjects. 

I studied first the repetition of passive movements 
whilst reading was occupying their attention other- 



DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS IN HEALTH. 89 

wise. The repetition was very distinct and developed. 
It might continue more than a minute without the 
knowledge of the subject. If, for example, the pencil 
held in the hand had been made to trace a series of 
curls, the hand went on of itself to trace as many as 
a hundred more. 

I now requested the subject to leave off her read- 
ing, to close her eyes, and to think with all possible 
attention of what was taking place in her hand. In 
these new conditions the repetition of passive move- 
ments appeared to diminish. When I asked the 
subject to look attentively at her hand while it was 
being made to trace curls, the movement stopped be- 
fore it had well begun. The stoppage was here caused 
by the attention of the subject, by her will ; in short, 
by all the elements of her personality. 

This is not all. I requested the same subject to 
resume her reading, and began again to impress 
movements on her hand. Under the influence of this 
mental distraction, the repetition of the movement re- 
appeared ; but it was much less distinct than before. 
The experiments had somehow instructed the subject, 
and it is probable that, in spite of the attention she 
gave to her reading, she watched her hand and pre- 
vented the movements from taking place. 

At this point I thought of an experiment which 
has thrown light on the very delicate mechanism of 
these psycho-motor reactions. Instead of occupying 
the subject with easy reading, I put before her a long 
addition-sum, and required her to do it without the 
smallest mistake. What I had foreseen happened ; 
repetition of the movements communicated to the 
hand began again, with a distinctness and a persist- 
ency which it did not possess during the reading. 



9° 



ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 



This experiment gave me the key to the problem I 
was trying to solve. I think I may sum up my last 
result thus : the state of voluntary distraction produced 
in the subject by the more exacting operation of ad- 
dition prevents the consciousness, the attention and 
the will from inhibiting the movements of the hand. 

A conclusion like this will perhaps, for a superfi- 
cial reader, have the appearance of a truism, and I 
should be very glad if it appeared absolutely common- 
place. But, when examined with care, the facts are 
seen to be very curious and significant. The experi- 
ments just described consist essentially in evoking 
two psycho-physiological processes which have noth- 
ing in common, such as reading on one side and 
repetition of a manual movement on the other. In the 
persons experimented on, the second of these pro- 
cesses was accomplished better when accompanied 
by the first. The automatic movements of the hand 
were only distinct when the subject was at the same 
time reading or adding up figures. 

This is not like our common experience. In most 
cases the mind cannot do two different pieces of work 
at once without one of them suffering and sometimes 
both. I have been able to establish this as it were de 
visu in experiments I have been following out for 
some time on the conflict of states of consciousness. 
The procedure I have employed — which I shall de- 
scribe at greater length elsewhere — consists in making 
a person squeeze an india-rubber tube rhythmically, 
while reading, or adding up mentally, or the like. 
The india-rubber tube is connected With a registering 
apparatus, and the pressures of the hand translate 
themselves into a tracing of which the slightest irreg- 
ularities can be detected. Now this tracing is fre- 



DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS IN HEALTH. 91 

quently irregular in the parts that coincide with the 
reading or addition ; and the irregularities are the 
more marked the more difficult and complicated the 
mental labor which the subject is asked to perform. 

This result, compared with that which I obtained 
in my experiments on automatic movements, is soon 
shown to be its inverse, and apparently its contra- 
dictory. The more the subject is distracted (by read- 
ing, mental calculation, &c.) the more irregular 
become the voluntary movements of the hand trans- 
mitted to the india-rubber tube ; and, if the distraction 
is very intense, these movements may cease com- 
pletely. On the contrary, the more distracted the 
subject is, the more regular and considerable become 
the automatic movements of the hand. The contrast 
is quite striking. 

I am in no haste to generalize these results. I 
only state what took place in my subjects. 

The explanation of the difference observed between 
the conditions of voluntary movement and those 
of automatic movement, however, appears to me a 
comparatively easy matter. When a person is asked 
to do two things at a time — to read a book, for exam- 
ple, and to execute some manual task — two motor 
impulses are evoked which start from the same per- 
sonality, from the same focus of consciousness. For it 
is the same person that is charged to do the two things 
at once, — to divide his attention and will between the 
two things. This coexistence of the two operations 
must evidently make each separately less perfect. The 
more attention each exacts because of its complexity, 
the more both will have to surfer from being carried 
on together. 

On the contrary, when an automatic action is 



92 ON DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS. 

evoked in one of the limbs by a stratagem — when the 
hand is forced, for example, to execute certain move- 
ments without consciousness — it is not the conscious 
personality of the subject that is appealed to. His 
conscious personality would only interfere in the ex- 
periment to inhibit the movement. This inhibition 
we avoid by turning away his attention ; and, if there 
is no inhibition when the person is distracted, it is due 
to the same cause that makes him unable to voluntarily 
squeeze the tube with regularity when he is distracted. 
Schematising these complex relations of states of 
consciousness, I arrive at the following result. In the 
case where a person performs at once a mental addi- 
tion and a muscular act, let the first operation be 
called a and the second b. Observation shows that 
each of them is prejudicial to the other, tends to inhibit 
it. Let the automatic activity of the hand be called 
c. There is in each subject a power to perceive this 
activity and to suppress it by holding the hand motion- 
less. Let this operation be called b. The operation 
b then can inhibit c. But occupation of the subject 
with reading, by provoking the operation a, prevents 
him from inhibiting the movements of his hand ; that 
is to say, a is permitted to inhibit b, and this prevents 
b from inhibiting c. There is here, to use a happy 
expression of M. Brown-Sequard, inhibition of a cause 
of inhibition. 



I wait for a future opportunity of following up 
this interesting line of study. If I make known my 
first results, it is because they bear on almost normal 
subjects, and because, consequently, every t>ne can, 
with a little attention and patience, check all that I 



DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS IN HEALTH. 93 

advance. Perhaps the results will be different for 
different persons. 

However that may be, the observations I have just 
related may contribute to show the rather embarrass- 
ing complexity of those inhibitory actions which psy- 
chologists have only begun to study within the last 
years. 



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